Body Double with Shereen Lani Younes

This week, Caitlin, Jamie, and special guest Shereen Lani Younes leer through a telescope at the movie Body Double.

(This episode contains spoilers)

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, listeners. We wanted to provide a content warning for
this episode because the movie, as well as our discussion
involves things like stalking, spousal abuse, physical assault, and violence
toward women. Just so everyone is aware. Enjoy the episode.

(00:21):
On the beck Doll Cast, the questions asked if movies
have women in um, are all their discussions just boyfriends
and husbands or do they have individualism? The patriarchy zef
invest start changing it with the bec Del Cast, Jamie Caitlin,
take a look into my telescope and observe from a

(00:45):
distance the movie Body Double and how it asks us
to be empathetic toward a protagonist who is Okay, we're
starting negative, reeling negative for coming in freezing. I'm sorry,
I can't stop looking at so my my dog is

(01:05):
here right now. I want to just say at the top.
First of all, welcome to the Bexelcast. Second of all,
you know this this movie is gonna be an interesting chat.
Third of all, Sonny's here and I got him a
couple of tennis balls because I'm a you know, I'm
you're a good mommy. I just like to give him things,
but they're squeaky. I didn't realize they were squeaky, and

(01:26):
he wouldn't stop barking at me until I gave him
all four. So there might be some squeaks. He has
them all, he's arranged them into a little diamond and
he just keeps looking at them lustfully, and then occasionally
he'll pick one up in his mouth and squeak it
and then put it back and then rearrange the diamond formation.
It's kind of sick and sick and perverted. It's because

(01:46):
I showed him body double. Well, I was gonna say,
I mean, speaking of looking at things lustfully. Yeah, I
know he learned it, he said, I learned it from
my boy to Palma horrifying. Okay, welcome to the Actel Cast.
My name is Jamie Loftus, my name is Caitlin Darante,
and this is our show where we examine movies through
an intersectional feminist lens, and we use the Bechtel test

(02:09):
simply as a jumping off point to inspire a larger
conversation about film. Flim flims. If you will, what is
the Bechtel test? Though, Jamie, I forget, well, the Betel
test is a movie or no, it's a It's an
Oh my God. It's a media metric created by Quirk
cartoonist Alison Bechdel, sometimes called the Bechdel Wallace Test, lots

(02:31):
of versions of it. Ours requires that two people of
a marginalized gender speak to each other about something other
than a man for more than two lines of dialogue
at very least, and they must have names in the
and and it should means that should be a meaningful interaction.
Can I give a quick anecdote example, please? There is

(02:52):
a really annoying Twitter joke that is recycled every time
a new movie comes out, where they're like, I'm sorry
to report like Hopgun Maverick does not pass the Bechtel test,
and it gets five trillion likes every time, and it's
never funny, and it annoys me. And it particularly annoyed
me yesterday when someone recycled that joke yet again to
say Minions Rise of Grew does not pass the Bechtel test. Now, listen,

(03:15):
I went to see Minions Rise of Grew last night
opening night, and it does pass the Bechdel test. So
not only have we been saying for years it's a
flawed metric to begin with, and plenty of incredible movies
do not pass the Bechdel test, but it is a
good jumping off point for discussion. Perhaps Minions did pass
the Beckdel test between Julie Andrews and Taraji p Henson.

(03:38):
And if that's not a super pass, I don't know
what sucking is. Tell me about it. Oh my god.
So that's the show, um, And today we are talking
about a pretty popular request, UM that we've gotten over
the years many times. It's a Brian to Palmer movie
called Body Double. It came out in four It's a

(04:00):
neo noir, erotic thriller, and people have been saying it's
sexist since it came out. So and if something is sexist,
I'm very excited to talk about it now. And we
have an incredible returning guest. Is this is this a three? Thin?
Your third time? Aladdin? Speed? Was there something something in between?

(04:20):
There was something in between? I think I think that
this might be four. I just can't remember the other one.
Maybe three, I don't know. I don't know. Time, Aladdin, Speed,
and Body Double is a is a pretty solid genre
spread too. Yeah, Well, let's introduce you properly. They are
a filmmaker. Half of the podcast ethnically ambiguous. It's Sharine
Lannie Unite, welcome back. Thanks for having me. I having

(04:46):
curious about this movie for so long, so I was
glad to have a reason to watch it. Um. I
don't know what I was expecting, because I don't like
knowing anything about a movie before I jump in, Like,
I know I want to see it, but I just
will not look any up about it. So it was
a ride. I did not know what I was getting into.

(05:06):
It was that so you had never seen this before? No, no, okay.
I was fascinated about, Like what if you had a
history with it? Are you like a Di Palma fan?
I mean not necessarily. I think he's like he's all untalented.
I think he's he makes it clear, especially in this movie,
that he's just horny all the time. But but I

(05:27):
just like that the poster is also really like erotic,
and like, I've just heard so much about this movie
for some reason, like maybe on letterbox and stuff. I
always saw it pop up and I was like, what
is this and that someone described it as aum the
hottest thriller of the eighties or the sexiest thriller of
the eighties, So I was like that piqued my interest.
But but yeah, I don't have any history with it

(05:48):
other than being just like very curious about it. And
now I know me either. I had never seen this
movie either. It was like vaguely on my radar. But
I will say that erotic thrillers are one of my
least favorite genres, so I never seek them out. And
Brian de Palma, I'm not a fan. There, I said it.

(06:11):
I don't like really any of his movies we've covered. Weirdly,
we've covered two diploma movies on this show before. We've
cavered Mission Impossible one, and we've covered Carrie. But he
also did Scarface, which Untouchables. Oh, I do like Blowout
with neither John Travolta. It's maybe my favorite John Travolta performance. Um,

(06:33):
I would recommend blow Out out of all of the
Apollo movies, I would recommend even over Face Off, which
I think is no no, no no, But that's John Travolta. Yeah, yeah,
oh yes, yes, Face Off is closest I've ever come
to converting to scientology easily. You're just like, um, maybe
he's got a point, because I love that movie. It's

(06:55):
one of my top five movies of all time. I
love that movie, Oh my gosh. But I would recommend
maybe second, and then I would recommend it for his
second best performance, Blowout. It's like it's like a in
that movie. I'm like, Oh, he's a good actor, you
know what I mean. But anyway, so Caitlin, you had
not seen it before, I had not, had you, I
had not. No. I think we all kind of had
a similar experience where I've been hearing about this movie

(07:17):
for years and I just sort of wasn't in a
rush to see it. Honestly, the main selling point for
me on this movie was I really like Melanie Griffith,
and I am always down to see Melanie Griffith in
a movie, and I thought she did a great job.
And I'm always just like sometimes seeing Melanie Griffith in
like movies in the eighties, who are just like, we're
not giving her the material that she needs. And you know,

(07:40):
it took a generation and now her daughter Dakota Johnson
is doing a lot of incredible work that Melanie Griffith
should have had access to as well. Anyways, some of
the only good nepotism in the world, as far as
I'm concerned, like that legacy. Agree amazing. But I knew
that this movie had been and controversial for really long time,

(08:03):
and I sunny that is really enough. But but I
didn't I don't know. I didn't know any of the
shrine like similar deal. I didn't know plot. I didn't
know anything. I didn't know that it started a Bill
Maher doppelganger that was really distracted, distracted, especially with his
hair slicked back when he was like playing the producer

(08:25):
person with his hair slick back. That's that's Bill Mark,
it is. I mean, I don't know anything about this guy.
He's been he's been nominated for a Golden Globe, like god,
bless good for Craig Wasson. Who's that. I mean, look,
we don't know. He could be a terrific guy. We
don't know. The point is he is he looks exactly
like someone despicable and it's like really despicable me. Shout

(08:49):
out to our Despicable Me episode on the Matreon. You guys,
I loved Rise. It grew so much. It was so funny.
There they made a joke about look Already Airport. That
was the minions essentially, Look, they fly a plane in
this one and it's so funny. Okay, we have to
we cannot get into the minions, so I hadn't. I'm

(09:11):
like kind of ambivalent towards the Palma. I think that
like his place in like movie history is kind of
interesting because he's like grouped in with all those famous
seventies directors and he's kind of one of the less
discussed of them, like that whatever, we're crazy. He's still
very discussed, but I feel like it's not well. But
I don't want to dump it into fun but like

(09:33):
I feel like it's like it's not discussed because his
movies are like so fucking awesome. Sure, he's just discussed.
I liked Carrie. Like I know, I haven't revisited in
our episode or the movie in a while, but I mean,
Carrie really stuck with me when I was younger. I
remember enjoying Phantom of the Paradise, but I like watched
it when I was sick a couple of years ago.
And other than that, I kind of don't have And

(09:55):
then you know, mission impossible. Sure why not Scarface? Scarf? Yes,
I have not seen Scarface. That's one of my like
right up there with I've not seen a single Godfather
and like Scarface is something that we will have to
cover eventually, and I dread the day he made Scarface

(10:16):
right before Body Devil, which is really interesting to me
because they feel completely different. But well, so he didn't
write Scarface. No, he didn't know. I just realized, like
as I was talking, like for Bobby Devil is said
story by to Palma that he wrote it with someone else.
But this movie is I mean the music, first of all,
very dramatic, like peeping music, like every time you see

(10:37):
that you saw the telescope, it was like this ethereal
weird music. And then like they were just it was
the music kind of scared me at times. I was
not expecting so much, like it was manipulative. Yeah, I
didn't like this movie and I like it, that's okay.
I didn't like it, and it was like it's weird too,
because it was like one of those movies that it

(10:58):
has been so like people didn't like when they came
out and they're like, this is weird Hitchcock rip off
that is like even worse to women somehow and people.
And then that was it for a while, and then
people were trying to reclaim it. They're like, no, it's commentary.
And then I'm like, uh, I couldn't get there. I
couldn't get like it's like horny Hitchcock, right, and it's

(11:20):
like Hitchcock also famously not a good person. Right. I've
got some quotes for for after we do the recap.
But like, I just was sort of because this movie
has undergone so many like rounds of analysis and like
some people have I think, like whatever, like think whatever
you want, but like try to reclaim it as like
this movie is commentary on voyeurism, it's not just voyeurism.

(11:43):
And I looked to see if di Palma had ever
given an interview to try to make that same case,
and he sort of like did not at all. He's like,
that's this is what happens in movies like by you know,
and so we'll we'll get to like the exact particulars
of what he has said about the movie. But I just, yeah,

(12:04):
looking for his thoughts on this movie didn't really change
my opinion of it in any way. I just I
thought it would be Honestly, because it's been talked about
so much, I thought it would be better. Like I
thought it would be paler than it was and that's
why I asked to watch Chicks. I was like, Oh,
finally this reason to watch this longest movie that I've
heard so much about. It's probably decent. Let's go, and

(12:25):
I will say I think it was. I'm glad we
watched it because there are a few lines that might
be like my favorite lines in cinema of all times,
that I just can't stop thinking about. There's which one
when he's in the acting class and the guys like
you are a baby and you're afraid and you must act,
and then he goes, I can't. I'm a sardine. Like

(12:46):
I just lost it, Like it was the stupidest line
I've ever heard in my entire life. I can't. I'm
a sardine. Uh. And then she's like you are a baby,
and I was like, I hear that. I feel that
in my bones. I mean. But other than that, I mean,
I also love Melanie Griffith. I really I think she
also deserved more just to be not as sexualized and

(13:07):
not as just like pigeonholed as she was. But also
she's like top build, but she doesn't come into the
movie until like an hour or more. But it's just
like who are you going to top Bill Craig Wesson?
Who then is that? Who? So? Okay, should I Well,
let's take a quick break first and then we'll get

(13:28):
into the recap and we are back, and should we
get into the recap and go from there? Yeah, let's
do it. Okay, So body double. We meet Jake Scully

(13:49):
played by Craig Watson, which, okay, first of all, Avatar
Jake Sully, Jake Scully, Yeah, distracting. I was like, for
a moment, I was like, is that Sully's name in Monsters, Inc?
And then it's not. Sully had a different first name,
James Sullivan. Yeah. And then I was like, but who's

(14:11):
Jake Sully? And then I didn't investigate further. But yes, Jamie,
you're right, Like, we don't have time to get into
Avatar right now, and we will be covering it later
in the year. It's a complicated film with a bizarro
fucking history. But Jake Sully, like, and they say his
name five trillion times, that's like, arguably the only thing

(14:33):
I remember is the tail scene and the fact that
there's a character named Jake Sully. Jake Sully. So Jake Scully,
Jake Scully that's on James Cameron. Yeah, he should have
not named his character basically the same thing. But we
meet Jake Scully. He is an actor in Hollywood. Ever
heard of it. He goes to an iconic hot dog

(14:54):
stand that no longer exists at the beginning of the
movie called Taylor the Pup, whose history I cover in
my hot Dog book. Oh, it's like that hot dog
shape building at the beginning of the movie, and it's
been moved to like, yeah, it still exists, but they
just like moved the building to like a storage unit.
But it's still around, there's just not hot dogs in
it anymore. Anyways, l A History. We were talking about

(15:16):
l A History a lot in Speed too. That's true. Yeah,
I mean, I they're a little bit cringe sometimes, but
I do appreciate, like a very appreciate. I think those
meta movies like You're You're suddenly on a movie set,
I think those are kind of funny, you know what
I mean, where they're likely higher to be filmed by
the crew. I just think it's like very funny to
me for some reason. Yeah, So this was the opening

(15:39):
to this was entertaining. I was like, oh, yeah, I've
never seen that before Bartie's Beanery Hello, because what happens is,
so we meet Jake Scully when he is in the
middle of filming a take for a vampire movie where
he is the vampire and he's in a coffin, but
he freezes and can't act because we'll learn that he

(16:02):
has claustrophobia, so he's struggling with that. We then see
Jake out of his vampire makeup and it is now
clear that he is a dead ringer for Bill Maher
and again it's very distracting, which I don't even know
if that was a person at the time, Like, I
know he's a lot, but I'm like, I don't even

(16:23):
think he was famous when this movie came out, So
that just sucks for Craig. Sorry Craig. So Jake goes
home and walks in on his girlfriend having sex with
another man, and he is devastated and he now needs
somewhere else to stay. He tries to carry on with
his life. We see him at interviews, auditions, we see

(16:48):
him at acting class, and then he meets and befriends
this guy named Sam who has a place for him
to stay because Sam has been house sitting for a friend.
This rich guys, I think also in the movie business.
In the picture business. He's got one of my favorite
movie props ever, the like bed that spins around. Oh yeah,

(17:11):
it's good. Yea. So also I looked it up. The
elevated circular house. It's just it's a house called what
was it called the Chemisphere, and it's in l A.
Was designed by John Lawtner in nineteen sixty and it's
like this like private historic thing. I thought that was
so interesting, just like the spaceship in the in the Hills.

(17:31):
Does it still exist? Yeah, it's still there. It's a
one story octagon on the San Fernando Valley side of
the Hollywood Hills off of Mulholland. It's just sitting there.
Let's go field trip. That's why I sort of assumed
it was like a model. I don't know. I just
was like, that doesn't exist, and I didn't ask any
more questions. That's wild. It was declared in l a

(17:54):
historical Cultural Monument in two thousand four. That's cool. Yeah,
that's the vibe. But I thought it was interested. There's
like a what's it called, like a little trolley that
even brings you up to the house. I've never seen
that in my life. Yeah, I know. I'm like, does
that Whoever lives there has to go on a little
roller coaster trolley ride every time they want to go home.

(18:14):
It was wild. That is terrifying. You're like, oh, that's like,
that's very exciting. But then also when you're going up
to a place like that, you're like, oh, this is
where I die. Like this is you know, there's no
coming down. But no one dies in that house. They
die in other houses, and they die in other houses.
So Sam has been house sitting for a friend who
lives in this house. But Sam is about to go
out of town for this five week gig he has,

(18:37):
so he arranges for Jake to stay at this place
while Sam is gone. So Sam shows Jake around the
house and he points out this telescope in the house
with a view of a neighbor woman who dances all
naked and sexy every night at the same time. And

(19:01):
Jake is like, oh whooa and he spies on her
for a really long time. It's all foamy And the
music is the music woud the peeping music is so
disturbing because it's so happy, right, because it's like, oh, la, la,

(19:22):
isn't this so awesome that he's spying on her? Exactly.
I've like seen arguments that like they're like, oh, I
guess that, like the Pomo was accused of ripping off
Hitchcock quite a bit because he did do that, Like
it was because he didn't. I mean, this movie is
literally Rear Window plus and Vertigo Vertigo, Yeah, exactly the hornier.

(19:43):
But like some people have made the argument that they're like, Okay,
he had been he had been received this criticism for
so long that he's like I'm going to triple down
and make it like I'm gonna make the worst movie ever. Um.
So yeah, I like read a whole piece on The
Independent that was like Body Double is De Palma's ultimate troll,
which to me, I like saw what he was saying.

(20:03):
But I was also like, um, but sometimes you just
make a movie that sucks and it's not like a
four a game of forty chess. I mean, yeah, in retrospect,
it's probably like you can say anything you're being a troll,
you know, if something sucks, you can be like I
was trolling, Like that's a good cop out. Yeah, if
you're called out on something that's my plan. I'm just like, yeah,
when I when I make something that fucking flops, Like, yeah,

(20:25):
that was that was supposed to Did I make you
think I did that on purpose? Yeah? Exactly, exactly right. Okay.
So he spies on this neighbor woman for a really
long time, and then later that night he watches her again,
but this time he sees a man in the room
with her. It seems to be her boyfriend or husband,

(20:46):
and Jake watches this guy hit the woman and then leave.
The next day, Jake gets word that he's been fired
from the vampire movie because the director doesn't want to
deal with his claustrophobia. So he's even more down on
his luck. And then that night he spies on the
neighbor woman again doing her sexy naked dance. And it's

(21:10):
the same naked dance every night, every night, always at midnight.
He did get context for it later, but it is
just so confusing to me that the character of like
he's just like so he is a sardine essentially, because
he just isn't asking questions that you need to be
even as like a perverted sex criminal. He's not asking

(21:35):
very obvious questions such as, why is it the same
routine every day? Like yeah, yeah, I mean I won't
get into like the actual plot, but I do think
it's very funny that the plot rides on him being
a creep, Like you know what I mean, Like he
had to have started this all because he the person,

(21:56):
knew he would look at her, Like that's that's the
whole play rides on this guy, like proving that he's
a creep. I just think that's and it goes off
like nobody's business. And also I feel like it also
rides on and it's like this, I don't disagree with
this necessary like but like also him being very certain
that he's not a creep, which is true of many creeps.

(22:18):
But I'm not a creep. I'm a political activist, right
There's like I'm a good guy. I was protecting her
and then the detective, who I'm like, are we supposed
to agree with the detective because I have a whole
thing about that. Yeah, yeah, I thought the same thing.
I was like for the first time or cop speaking
a good point and then but I think the movie

(22:38):
thinks no. But yeah, well we'll get into that a
little ambiguous. Yeah, So he's watching Jake Sully's slash. Scully
is watching the woman do her naked dance the same
exact routine is before, and this time he notices another
creepy guy watching her from a distance as well. The

(22:59):
next day, Jake runs into the neighbor woman on the street.
They're like both an intersection or there in their cars,
and he sees the creepy guy from the night before
also stalking this woman. So Jake follows the woman, presumably
to keep an eye on her and like try to
keep her safe question mark, And she goes to this

(23:22):
shopping center. He watches her go into a store, peeps
at her while she's trying on a pair of underwear,
and meanwhile the creepy guy is still stalking her also,
so Jake's kind of keeping an eye on both her
and this other stalker. Jake then gets into an elevator
with her. Wait before they get in the elevator, the

(23:46):
first I believe the first line a woman has in
the Hall movie has a woman calling security on Jake.
I think it's like it's like over a half hour
into the movie, because we've seen many women at this point,
we've spent we spent minutes at a time, lingering on
this dance routine. We see like there's a lot of

(24:07):
Jake looking. I mean, the whole movie is Jake looking
at women, and that's obviously on purpose. But even when
he catches his girlfriend cheating on him, she just like
stares at him of like oh, yike, right, and then
and then he just leaves so she doesn't even get
a line of dialogue. And then, yeah, the first time
you hear a woman speak it is to call security

(24:27):
on him for being a peeping tom on Gloria while
she's getting changed in of fucking dressing room, but also
protecting her. You're like, what, she leaves an enormous gap
in the curtain of the dressing room, just like in
the middle of it, and it's like that's not a
choice that anyone makes the time. Well, yeah, it's like

(24:49):
the way that the character characters are written in this
movie are like completely irrational. But like, I did think
it was funny that it takes a half hour for
a woman this week, and then it's just like, we
need to get this guy out of here. There's not
a single crew member who's female or talks. There's not
a single any even side character women voices, and I think, uh,

(25:10):
because you see the woman in the store interact with
the person he's stalking for like a minute, but you
don't hear the conversation. So I was like, if we
heard the conversation, maybe this would pass the test. But
maybe not just talking about underwear. We're watching. We're watching
the creepy is guy alive observing them having a conversation? Yeah,

(25:31):
well staring at the Uh. This movie is so bizarre.
Um yeah, yeah, I don't love it. I hate it.
Um Okay, So Jake, so he's like kind of following
and keeping an eye on everyone. He then gets into
an elevator with her, but oh no, his cluster photo
we h uh. And then she throws her old pair

(25:51):
of underwear away after she's bought this new pair. Who knows. Wait,
I thought it was the new pair. She throws away
the old one. I think so because she where's the
new one out of the store and she puts the
old pair in the bag? Yeah, he was. It was
a sniffing situation. So he he takes her old underwear
out of the trash, and I do think he smells it. Yeah,

(26:14):
And I mean not to king shame. But he as
I say, but it's like, but she, you can't do that.
You can't underwear from them without them knowing. Yes. So
he takes her to wear out of the trash, and
then he follows her to the beach, spies on her there,
eavesdrops on her phone conversations, and then Jake see's the
creepy guy again, the other sorry, the other creepy guy.

(26:38):
He gets so close there. I was talking to kill
It about this over text yesterday, where like in that
scene where like he's watching her from like the tents
on the beach, and then she looks at him, and
the music swells as if to be like she does
notice him, and you're like, oh my god, what's going on?
And then two seconds later, Because honestly, I did strung

(27:00):
able to like pay attention to this movie. It's really hard.
I kept kind of getting distracted because there's all these
long wing grief shots where it's like creepy and nothing
is happening. So I looked down at my phone for
ten seconds, and then I looked up again and he
was like standing right behind her, and she had no idea.
This is yet another example of like object of protagonist

(27:21):
desire has no spatial awareness for plot reasons, it's so
frustrating situation. So so he's on the beach now he's
stalking this woman whose name we will learn is Gloria Revel.
Pretty soon he's doing exactly what the other creepy guys doing,
which is also stalking her. But Jake catches up to

(27:41):
her and he's like, someone's following you and she's like,
I know, and he's like, but it's not me, and
it's like, yes it is, and also it's someone else,
and just then the other creepy guy grabs her purse
and runs off, so Jake chases after him, but the
guy runs into a tunnel and Jake can't keep going
because of his claustrophobia. So the guy takes something out

(28:03):
of the purse, we're not sure what yet, and then
he runs off. So then the woman catches up. Gloria
catches up with Jake, and then they start making out
for a while. Just kisses her for a while. It's uncomfortable,
and it's also like, it looks like it makes me uncomfortable,
but they also look uncomfortable. She looks uncomfortable because she's

(28:25):
saying no no, yes, no, yes, no, not here because
she's like into it, we're supposed to think for a while,
and then she's like but no, I can't not here,
and then she runs off. I kept waiting for that
to be revealed to have been like a fantasy of Jake's,
especially like the more it's completely irrational when it happens,

(28:48):
but then as the plot goes on and it becomes
this whole like bizarrow conspiracy, Hollywood something blah blah blah,
Like it makes less and less sense the more you know,
because the more you know, the more you're like, how
does Gloria even know this guy exists? Like half the
time he was peeping on her, it wasn't even hurt.
Like it's so bizarre that she would want anything to

(29:11):
do with this guy. Yeah, I kept waiting for it
to be like the whole thing is a dream, but
she's just so horny. But like that's the thing. Every
woman in this movie is so ready to have sex,
which no judgment on that, but it does not with
Jake Scully, Like why does she make out with him
when he just like starts kissing it? Like that didn't

(29:33):
make And like you said, I thought it was going
to be a fantasy, because there are other moments in
the movie where he seems to be fantasizing about something,
but like, it turns out not to be a fantasy.
They actually kissed on the beach, and for some reason
she was into it for a while. She runs off eventually.
It's so like the camera angle on that scene where

(29:54):
it's like spinning around them. It's supposed to be really
like sweeping romantic and like, so again, I feel like
even the camera work in the music is leading you
to believe that this isn't actually happening, but then it
just was. I thought so too, but then it just
was confusing bad filmmaking. Okay. That night, Jake spies on

(30:17):
Gloria in her home again with the telescope, and he
sees the other creepy guy in her house now, so
he tries to call her and warn her. He runs
to her house to help her, but the creepy guy
attacks Gloria with a large power drill and kills her.
Jake breaks into her house to save her, but it's

(30:39):
too late. She has been murdered. I guess the power
drill thing is a thing in Scarface as well, and
so everyone was just like, Okay, Brian de Palma is
obsessed with power drills. I don't remember that. But it's
also been like over fifteen years since I've seen Scarface.
I'm realizing I don't like crime syndicate movies. I find
them very boring. But we will cover The Godfather someday

(30:59):
on this show, because it was because I think it
would be funny. Yeah, well, yeah, someday. We cut to
the cops at the scene of the crime and we
meet Detective McLean, who questions Jake and he's like, you're
the only witness, and also you're a peeping tom and
a pervert, and I can see Gloria's underwear in your

(31:20):
pocket right now, and kind of what that the whole scene.
We were talking about it a little earlier, but you're like,
first of all, it's disorienting because the cop appears to
be correct, but also we're not supposed to, Like Brian
to Paul was like a cab. The one time a
cop is correct, it's like so exactly. Also in that scene,

(31:42):
I feel like this is it just feels very nineteen
eighties that in that scene and also very now, but like,
particularly with like the mask offulness about it. The detective
correctly says, like peeping is against the law. He could
have like, he's like, I'm not gonna hold you. He
says sexual harassed or like sexual something you said, like
you're a sexual whatever he said, but the guy was like, no,

(32:05):
I'm not. He calls him a sex offender, I think,
and he's right, but then he's like, but I can't
I can't hold you. I'm like, but you literally can
you just correctly stated the crime he's committing. And then
later on when like Jake calls him back, it's like
talking his fucking Q and on bullshit. The detective is like, oh,

(32:25):
it's if it isn't Hollywood's biggest sex offender. And I'm like,
just arrest him, Like what do you mean? I just like,
at every turn, At every turn, Jake makes it increasingly
harder to root for him, you know what I mean,
Like he's not really someone. It's just in the beginning
you're like, oh, I feel bad, this guy got cheated
on right in front of his face. And then you

(32:47):
as the more you go on, you're just like, oh,
he's terrible. Yeah, I have a whole thing about that.
So the cop is questioning Jake, and this is when
they start referring to the creepy stalker killer guy as
the Indian because he appears to be an indigenous man.

(33:08):
I didn't even think about that. The first thing I
noticed about the creepy guy that they made him very ugly,
like like his face was like melting off, and so
I thought it was funny, like, oh, they're making the
evil guy ugly, surprise, surprise, But then to call him
like an Indian was so random to me. I was like, what,
that's what you were going for this whole time, like
a tan leathery man. Right. It almost felt like the

(33:31):
movie tell on itself because I agree with you, like
they like, it's an extremely offensive thing to say. And
also I was like if they hadn't said that, I
never in a million years would have guessed that that
was what exactly they had been going for. So it
makes it like twice as bad. And then it's like
a fucking horror movie proce any spoiler alert, but like

(33:53):
you have to watch this movie. So so we learned that.
Then we see Jake watching porn and he sees because
like the movie, then just as like, well, this murder happened.
Let's have Jake watch porn like what to get over
it to console himself, right, because he loves peeping. He

(34:15):
loves watching. So he sees a performer named Holly Body
played by Melanie Griffith, doing the exact same sexy dance
in the porn film as Gloria was doing in her
house while Jake was peeping on her, and he's like,
wait a minute, why is that the same dance? So
he goes and tries to get close to Holly, which

(34:36):
he does by auditioning for a porn role opposite Holly.
He gets the part. They do a scene together and
then Jake pretends to be this rich porn producer and
he acts like he wants to cast Holly in his movie,
and again he's really starting to look like Bill Maher
At this point. It's starting to get pretty disturbing. And

(35:00):
it's also like, like, I don't know, Jake sucks so
bad as a character, But like once he got to
the point where he was pretending to I was like,
what is even his end game? What is he doing?
The movie got so confusing for me at this point
because I just could not follow the jump between this
murder and then suddenly he's like, I'm a porn actor.

(35:22):
Now I'm like I couldn't follow his motive, Like why
is he doing that? I didn't understand at first. And
also I hated I really hated that they made him
like into a good lover because like she was like
really into it, and just like I really disliked that.
But yeah, he also gets like ten shades darker when
he becomes this Holliway producer, which I think is really weird.
It's like a tan, like a Hollywood tan. He keeps

(35:45):
getting creepier and creepier. So he's like, I want to
put you in my movie. I also want to hire
you for a private performance. So she goes to this
place where he's been staying and then he's like, by
the way, I'm not a porn producer. There's no movie
that I'm trying to cast you in. What I need
to know is did someone hire you to dance in
the house across the way? And she reluctantly tells him yes,

(36:09):
it was her dancing, and that Sam is the guy
who hired her to put on this little show, knowing
Jake would be watching it through the telescope. So Jake
starts to piece together that Sam set up Jake to
be the witness to this murder. He wanted Jake to
watch the neighbor woman and hired Holly Body to be

(36:33):
a body double for Gloria, and that basically, Sam, whose
real name is Alexander Ravel a k a. Gloria's his
wife or no, her husband, he wanted to kill his wife, Gloria,
so he made sure Jake witnessed someone else committing the

(36:55):
murder so that no one would suspect Alexander ravel While
that this all kind of works out for him. Yeah, yeah, truly.
So Jake is figuring all of this out. But Holly
is pissed that Jake lied to her and lured her
there under false pretenses, so she storms out, but oh no,

(37:18):
she gets abducted by the creepy guy, the murderer. So
Jake goes after her to save her, and then he
comes upon them in a reservoir. The creepy guy is
digging a grave to dump Holly body into. How do they?
How do he find him? How did they? How did
he find there? She was like running on foot from
the cops. Right suddenly he knows where they are. I

(37:40):
don't know. I don't know that is a plot hole.
So but he finds them and Jake scuffles with the
murderer um and he turns out to be Sam a
k a. Alexander Revel, wearing a mask of apparently an
indigenous person because again they keep calling him the Indian.

(38:03):
But he's wearing this like fake prosthetic mask that Jake
rips off of him, and it's revealed that he is
Sam a k a. Alexander Ravel, and that he had
just been wearing this mask every time that we saw
that character. Then Jake ends up in the grave. He
can't get out because of his claustrophobia, but then he
has this like fantasy about how he's back on the

(38:24):
set of the Vampire movie and he's able to overcome
his claustrophobia in that moment and he's able to get
out of the grave, but then Alexander's dog attacks. There's
also a very anti dog agenda in this movie that
I did not appreciate every dog, and also if you
read the movie correctly, it is a good dog agenda,

(38:44):
because all the dogs are like, let's kill Jake Scully,
let's get him, let's get rid of him. He's dogs things, yes,
but the dog knocks the bad guy into like the
water at the reservoir, and then Jake helps Holly out
of the grave and the dog dies with him. Right,
the dog is just in the water now maybe dead um.

(39:07):
And then Jake helps Holly out of the grave, but
she's like, you're sick, you're a necrophiliac. And then she
gets back into the grave and then just sits there
and he's like, fine, stay in there if you do.
You know though, that's how you know you've really found
a vile person. If you're like I would rather literally
hang in this grave then go to safety with you,

(39:29):
So goodbye, And that's how the scene ends. That's how
he's like, are you go? And then right, and then
we cut away. It's like maybe, and then we cut
away to Jake on set of the Vampire movie. He
has apparently been hired back to play the part, and
they're shooting a scene where the woman who is in

(39:51):
the scene with him has a body double for the
shots of her breasts. So, just when you thought there
couldn't be any more l gays cinematography in this movie,
the movie ends with just a long shot of the
body doubles bare breasts the longest the longest shot on
a boob I've ever seen in the movies ever, truly,

(40:13):
and then the body double and the actor in this
scene who's playing opposite Jake is being murdered actively by
this vampire that Jake is playing. So that's how the
movie ends, and we're like, who, I do think it's
funny as a vampire. He has blonde slipped back here,
so I think it's even more kind of Bill Murray

(40:34):
but was better makeup. But I also think you skipped
over something. There was a scene that I had to replay.
But it's the musical on the set of the porn shoot. Yes,
there's suddenly relaxed by what's I don't know who's. It
just starts blasting and it's the band. It's the band
who sings the song is performing. Maybe one of the

(40:55):
only parts that I did like, Yeah, I like that part.
I was like, whoa poor musical? Okay, I'm doubt But
it's also confusing because because you realize that it's part
of the porn movie that is being shot that Jake
is in, but that's not clear for a while, so
it just seems like Jake is just like in the
sex club wearing glasses and there's someone singing directly at

(41:19):
him even and I'm like, is this a fantasy? Is
this what is happening? Is this like him going to
a sex club for research? Like it's not clear what's happening.
And then you're like, oh, I guess this is part
of the porn movie. Sure, but you don't see the
cameras until the actual sex scene. So it's like, what anyways,

(41:40):
a little thirty seconds though or something. I really enjoyed music.
It is fun. If I saw that without contacts for
what the movie was, I'd be like, yeah, yeah, looks
like a cool movie. So that is body double. Let's
take another break and we will come back to discuss.

(42:03):
And we're back, all right, So where shall we? I
think that maybe starting with some a little bit of
diploma context will like kind of set up the rest
of the discussion, because I do feel like there are
people who get I mean, I feel like this is
true of all like you tour direct tools, but like
I feel like this like this group of guys specifically,

(42:26):
people really get their holes get all tense if you
don't love it, which we've been dealing with this for years,
but I just wanted to start by contextualizing where this
comes in his filmography and what he said about the movie,
because I do feel like it kind of like neutralizes
any film boy like it's actually good. I'm like, I

(42:48):
don't even think Brian de Palma thinks that, but go off.
So this movie comes in like, like you said, she
comes right after Scarface. It also comes um within a
few years of his other major Hitchcock rip off, which
is called Dressed to Kill. I haven't seen it. I
have seen that very Hitchcock roop off. So it's basically

(43:11):
a rip off of Psycho that there's been a lot
of discussion around. It's very, very problematic. You should have
to watch it eventually just to understand how weird it is. Right, Like,
there's there's a very like it's about trans person who
is a psychopath murderer. So you know, look, there's been
that's a separate episode Michael Caine. Ok Right, that movie

(43:34):
gets brought up in disclosure. I think, ye, yes, Okay,
that's how I know it. Okay, yes, exactly. So that's
like the era that he's in at this time, and
I think we should just cover Dressed to Kill at
a different time because we don't really have the bandwidth
for it today. But so that's like sort of where
he would like he's he's trying it not to be

(43:56):
like completely reductive, but it just seems like he's kind
of going for like edge Lord Hitchcock vibe at this
phase in his career, like post production Code Hitchcock, where
he's like, well, I can make a Hitchcock movie, but
now really sexy and really like gratuitous nudity and violence
and violence toward women. I can make it any phobic

(44:16):
you want, transphobic, homophobic, yeah, misogynistic, whatever you whatever you want.
It's you can do that now. Um not not us,
like I mean, not advocating for the fucking production code,
but like this is like kind of was where he
was at at this time. I feel like it's interesting
where a lot of movies we talked about from this

(44:37):
era are considered to be very sexist in retrospect, this
movie was also considered very sexist when it came out,
which I think is like kind of unusual, especially, I
mean whatever, We've covered a million movies from the eighties
and nineties. I mean, I'm surprised to hear that, right,

(44:58):
like you, I honestly, I don't trust people from the eighties.
But there was a big backlash to this movie when
it came out. It was not a hit. It was
not reviewed well at the time. So let me see okay,
So Vincent Canby of The New York Times says, de
Palma quote again goes too far, which is the reason

(45:20):
to see it. It's sexy and explicitly crude, entertaining and
sometimes very funny. And then he just says, like it's
a sexiest rip off of Hitchcock. So it gets like
very very mixed reviews. The biggest point of contention when
the movie comes out is the drill scene, which we'll
talk about, but like that gruesome a murder of a

(45:42):
woman who we barely know and barely get to hear
speak also bothered viewers in the eighties. It sparked a
lot of feminist backlash as well. But that was what
bothered them the most. I didn't realize. I mean, I
know it's bad, but if that's the one that the
thing that bothered them the most, it's kind of weird
to me. But he continued, Yeah, that that is like
where the focus of most of the criticism. Like there's

(46:05):
a lot of people that were like they lost me
at the drill and not at the Peeping Thompson, which
I feel like is the exactly Yeah, the drill isn't
exactly like misogynistic per se. It's like gross but right, Okay.
So and then as far as what de Palma says
about this stuff, I mean, he's like I remember watching

(46:27):
this came out maybe like five or six years ago.
There was a documentary about his work where he was interviewed.
It was made by like Noah Bomboch, and he was
asked about how he frames and portrays women in his
work because a lot of people, I think correctly think
that he's really bad at it. Uh, and what he now,

(46:53):
So de Pauma is kind of well, I'll just read
the quote, but like kind of deflective and like the
sort of thing where you're like you can tell and
like someone's been asked the same question and they like
maybe secretly know they're wrong and they're like, oh, this
question again, and it's like, yeah, you've never answered it.
Um Okay. So here's what he said a couple of
years ago to Entertainment Weekly about body double. Specifically, he says, quote,

(47:18):
I've been dealing with this all my career. Fortunately now
Quentin Tarantino has to deal with it, so I don't
have to deal with it anymore. Violence and women. He's
the director who has the biggest persona in that area.
In fact, we had a conversation about it once, which
was funny. I say the same thing over and over again.
If I can create a sequence where you're gazing at
a woman or following a woman, it seems to me
like a basic building block of cinema. I think it

(47:40):
was Jean Luke Goddard who said the history of cinema
is men photographic women. I mean, look at advertising. Every
magazine cover is a woman. It draws the gaze of
a man and the gaze of a woman who's looking
at what she's wearing. We look at women all the time,
look at the red carpet and can all they do
is take pictures of women, and it dominates the coverage.
It's so obvious to me. It's not thing I discovered. Unquote.

(48:01):
So I feel like he is like pretty blatantly like, yeah,
everyone's sexist, and that's why I am like, that's kind
of like what a good defense. I mean, I just
looked up. I was honest Wikipedia, I was curious about
like his romantic life. Nothing weird there. But there is
a quote that I'm seeing on Wikipedia because he responded

(48:23):
to these accusations saying, I'm always attacked for having an erotic,
sexist approach, chopping up women, putting women in peril. I'm
making suspense movies. What else is supposed to happen to them? Yes,
I yeah, that's another one. I thought like he's extremely
like learning about his attitude towards the subject, maybe like

(48:44):
the movie even less because I thought, like, I mean,
there's nothing to be said for being openly misogynistic. But
it is a little bit surprising to hear someone not
even bothered to make up a weird lie about it.
I guess I appreciate that he's like, yeah, I'm sexist,
you could believe it. But and a lot of people
take it take it which is but people think it's

(49:05):
like this reflective self conscious awareness thing. That's the thing
that that that is most of his defense for other
from other people anyway. But right, so yeah, like all
the all the defense I was reading of this movie
rest on Brian de Palma being aware of things that
he is saying he doesn't care about. So I just

(49:27):
feel like, you know whatever, it's a movie, think whatever
you want. It's not a particularly influential movie, and I'm
happy for that. But yeah, I feel like he's basically
given you all the information you need. He's given us
all the clues Mr police Man, Mr Policeman, much like
Jake Scully. So anyways, that's that's the context of the movie.

(49:49):
And it made me really um dislike Brian de paul
personally seriously, right, because so this movie can basically just
be summarized as a movie about a man leering at

(50:09):
a woman without her knowledge or consent, following stalking, eaves
dropping on this woman, stealing her underway, like all this stuff.
And of course this lends to a lot of leering
male gaze cinematography, maybe more so than in any movie
I've ever seen, which, like you could argue, matches up

(50:33):
with the leering and peeping that Jake is doing. So
that's why the choice is made. But like that just
me like, you just made a movie about a man leering,
and that's you made a movie about a sex offender, right,
and why are you doing that without making any actual commentary,
you're just following a sex offender sefender, like right, a

(50:54):
sex offender who is like certain he's not a sex offender,
which the movie does not do very much to push
back on. I feel like the most of the movie
does is have the detective repeatedly be like, what's up,
sex offender and in a few moments with hot with
Holly where she is correctly like, you need to get

(51:17):
away from me, but like, but I don't. I still
think the movie is essentially like I don't know. It
seems like the movie is kind of behind him definitely,
because I think when the cop challenges him and calls
him a sex offender and a pervert and a peeping
tom and all that stuff, I think this is the
movie just framing the cop as being an obstacle for

(51:39):
the protagonist who we are supposed to be rooting for,
more than the movie actually making any commentary on stalkery
sex offender behavior. Because again, this character who is stalking
and and peeping and doing all man or of other
horrible things, this is the guy we're supposed to be
rooting for, and even though he's doing the same exact things,

(52:02):
what the antagonist is doing. It's because Jake's intentions are
like quote unquote pure and like to keep a woman
safe and like all this stuff. It's actually fine that
he's a stalker according to the movie, and like you
mentioned Stream, like the movie does all these things to
frame Jake in such a way that we are meant

(52:23):
to sympathize with him, because, yeah, he got his heartbroken
by his cheating girlfriend, he got fired from the movie
that he's on. He has childhood trauma and claustrophobia, like
all of these things that are there to make the
audience empathize and sympathize with him. And he is like
trying to save women in peril from this quote unquote

(52:47):
evil Indian and he's this you know, quote unquote safe
white man, and there's a whole conversation to be had
about that. But he has these intentions of, oh no,
I'm only stalking to save this woman from this other stalker,
and that's what the whole movie is predicated on. And
I do hate it. Yeah, I think, yeah, I think

(53:11):
two things. One, he gets everything he wants in the end,
so obviously it's like you're meant to root for this
person that like gets his career back. Also, Holly is
on set when he is shooting this, so it's like,
presumably they've made up. Maybe they're even fucking I don't know.
Oh wait, I didn't even notice that. Yeah, she's there. Yeah.

(53:31):
And the other thing is it's not like novel, but
two people can be creeps, and if one is ugly,
that's the bad guy, you know what I mean, Like,
I think someone not being like hideous and being white
and like kind and quotes looking like I think that
gets such a pass. And because the other guy is
like hideous to look at, it's obvious to be like, oh,
that is the bad guy. And I think that is

(53:53):
where some people's wires get cross because they're like, well,
that guy, he looks like a good person. He's trying
to protect her. But if he looked ugly, you want
to think that, right, And it's like it's the it's
the Steve bushemy principle. It's the effect. And it's also
like I don't know, Like again, I just don't see
the argument for like this being commented on in the

(54:14):
movie because it's like he wins in the end, and
it's like, I I don't know, I mean I try
to like engage. Yeah, like he he ends up fine,
even though, and then there's this kind of like bizarre,
complicated like interaction with once he gets involved in the
porn industry. I feel like it's almost like conflating what

(54:39):
Jake does, which is sex crimes, with the porn industry,
where there are certainly ethical issues and like there's you know,
plenty of reporting about how performers are not kept as
safe as they need to be, and there's certainly a lot,
but it's it's just I feel like generally casts the
entire industry is like hedonistic and debaucherous and the same

(55:00):
thing as being a peeping tom essentially, and like that
is like super reductive, especially when like Holly is like
the only character of any gender in the movie who
seems to have like a shred of dignity, Like she's
I really liked when because she's brought into Jake's life

(55:21):
under false circumstances, like he is lying to her. But
in that first scene where they go to the bar
together after the shoot, she like states her like baseline
right away, and she's like, this is how much money
I make, this is what I will do, This is
what I won't do. These are non negotiable things, what
do you think? And like that's kind of your introduction

(55:43):
to who she is, and so of all the things
in this movie, I fucking really don't like. I did
like that she, I mean, she sees Jake for who
she is, even if the movie doesn't share that opinion
or whatever. And she also like knows what she is
willing to do, would not do, Like she's very like
firm and who she is. And again it's like it's interesting,

(56:06):
and again it's like whatever, I know, we can't say
like what the movie's opinion is explicitly. But I liked
seeing porn star, you know, be portrayed as someone who
is like in control of their life and like, because
that's like very often the case, and I feel like
they're rarely portrayed that way in media. And but then

(56:30):
every other character outside of Holly the movie is not
portrayed that way at all, and so you're just like what, um,
I liked Holly a lot. I didn't like that she
appears to stay in Jake's life after, because, like you're saying,
the last time you see her, she's hiding from him
in a grave. So like under what circumstances did they

(56:51):
overcome that? I don't know, but I liked that she
told them to funk off kind of at every appropriate term,
But then the movie forces them together in some regard
in the end. Anyways, I think it was confusing, though,
because at first I thought of it as a continuation
of his fantasy, because it was because we we had

(57:13):
just seen the fantasy of him being able to do
the coffin scene, to be able to get out of
a grave, and so part of me was like, is
this a continuation of that timeline or like what he wants?
Like I wondered that too, But the movie doesn't set
up enough of a precedent for him having these fantasies
really that it was clear whether or not that was

(57:34):
a fantasy, because there's that other scene that we already
talked about where we're like, is this a fantasy or no,
where he's kissing Gloria on the beach, and that turns
out not to be a fantasy. So I don't know,
so unclear. It's confusing. It's and the way okay, and

(57:55):
then Glorious character, as we've been talking about throughout, I
can't make as their tails of what's going like truly
written to be oblivious. It's just like a waif, like
hot white, rich lady who cannot We were just talking
about this, I mean in a very different movie. We're
talking about the forty year old virgin, but like a

(58:16):
characters who is like so aimless and underwritten in horny
that they don't notice home intruders, like right behind the door.
She glides by him at every moment. He's just like
there's one moment where she answers the phone and he's
literally like two ft behind her and she just doesn't
see him because her back is turned. It's it's so bizarres.
And it's the same thing with Jake when he's standing

(58:38):
right behind her, like he's like looming above her on
the balcony at the beach shortly before they're making out
for no reason, and you're just that is really started,
that trope is really starting to bother me. Um, hot
woman with no spatial awareness, and you're just like, oh
my god. That is like most marginalized people are like
hyper aware of who's around them. I would have to be.

(59:01):
You have to be for your own safety. This is
something that I've talked about a lot especially in horror movies,
where I feel like I'm victim blaming because I'm like,
how did you not notice this? Or why did you
do this thing to get you killed? It's not a
real person, it's a Brian de Palma person, right, But
it's always characters, female characters written by men, who are
written in such a way that they're oblivious because it

(59:24):
serves the story and not because that's how anyone actually
behaves in real life. The same thing with like the
she leaves like an eight inch gap in the curtain
of the dressing room, right, you wouldn't do not because
anyone does that, but because the movie needs to allow
Jake to peep on her as she's putting a new
pair of underwear on. Like, I just I hate and

(59:46):
I and I hate I hate that I am doing
this kind of victim blame me thing, But it's not.
It's not victim blame me if it's written that way, right,
Like the men are writing them in a way that
they have sperienced life. Yeah, I still always feel weird
about it, but yeah, it's it's like I'm blaming these
female characters who don't actually exist and who are underwritten

(01:00:09):
by men. Who don't know how women actually behave and
don't know that we are constantly on guard for our
own safety at every waking moment. Terrified of them. Yeah
we're not even or like yeah that it's like not
that we're terrified of them, We're actually in love with them,
which is one of the fucking scariest things you can

(01:00:31):
perpetuate in your mood. Like I know a million people
who have experienced ship like that of like a creepy
person who like is convinced that you know exactly who
they are and you're just like playing hard to get
and someday you're going to be together and it's gonna
be very romantic and cool. And it's like that is

(01:00:52):
just like not really a thing that happens, but perpetuating
it put women in danger all the time. Like I
don't know, I've been in situations like that, like and
it's it's always very I can't believe that wasn't a
fantasy sequence. Like both from like a writing perspective and

(01:01:12):
from like a bectelcast perspective, it is just like what
the fuck like And it also like I don't even
really know that it like moves the plot forward in
any way for that to be true, the movie could Yeah,
like the movie could play out the exact same way
if that didn't happen totally, yeah right, Like, but I

(01:01:33):
think it added to this illusion or this lie that
he's just like amazing lover that women want to fuck,
you know what I mean, Like I painted that element
of his character very very much, right, because it just
it further just establishes him as a likable and empathetic
character or a character who we are supposed to empathize
with because oh, if he look at him, go, he's

(01:01:56):
he's a sexpot and he makes women come and isn't
that cool? And it's like, first of all, no, he doesn't,
and secondly, he's a fucking creep. Right Yeah, It's just
it's so frustrating and yeah, whatever, Like I'm trying to
think of other like I mean, I mean it's interesting

(01:02:17):
because I feel like, not even that much happens in
this movie. It's two hours long, but there's just it's
all very At least an hour of it is just
shots of Jake following a woman like there's very little,
and then she's brutally murdered, which seride, I agree with you,
like because I like, I mean, look, I'm I'm a

(01:02:38):
soft franchise head. I like to see someone die in
a brutal way. I don't like to see a character
I know fucking nothing about who I've never seen make
a shred of sense in the entire movie brutally murdered
with a drill. But you also kind of don't see
her brutally murdered with a drill. I think it is
far more disturbing to see her followed around, Like I
felt more nervous watching herp followed for an hour by

(01:03:01):
multiple people then watching her get murdered by a drill.
And I don't think that's the unpopular opinion, unfortunately, because
one of those things happens all the time. I don't know,
peeping truly fucking terrifies me because you know what happens
all the time. Yeah, you can also say the drill
is like phallic as well, which is also like another layer,

(01:03:23):
Like I'm sure some film studies professor is talking about
that right now, exactly. I don't think this film even
had a chance, or like gave itself a chance of
passing the Beachdale test. Like there's two women that we
see in the movie. One of them is very like
has two words that she says and the other one

(01:03:45):
and then gets murdered. Yeah, and then the other one
isn't isn't introduced until an hour into the movie, and
she oh, she does. Well, we'll get to this. But
the other major topic of discussion for this movie is
and kind of going back to what you were discussing
Sharene about the well, one of these stalkers is quote

(01:04:06):
unquote safe because he's classically handsome, and then also is
he sorry, but he's not hideous. I don't think he's handsome,
but he's like not he's he looks like a good guy,
like in quotes you know what, right, he is not
being others like down slanted like puppy eyes or whatever.
He does have like a kind looking face. He looks
like a little dog to me. Yeah, yeah, yeah, a Bilmar.

(01:04:29):
I think I think I'm just reacting to him looking
like Bill Mar. Yeah, that it is. It continues to
be very distracting, but the audience is he's framed in
such a way by the movie, by the filmmakers to be,
you know, the handsome, safe white guy. And then the
other stalker who the movie telegraphs to the audience is

(01:04:52):
evil and he's the stalker you have to be scared of. Uh.
And then he has come to known as the Indian,
and for a large chunk of the movie, we are
led to believe that an unnamed Indigenous man is a
creepy stocker murderer, which obviously has very racist and harmful

(01:05:13):
implications that you know, like as a woman and as
a white woman especially, right, that's the type of person
that you have to be afraid of, these non white
strangers who lurk in the shadows, even though statistically, and
we've talked about this all the time, not the women
who are survivors of assaulter who are stocked and murdered

(01:05:35):
are usually done so by people they know, and often
it's their own partners, which turns out to be true
in this movie because the Indian quote unquote is just
her husband in a mask. But the movie is like
not operating on a high enough level to like be
able to land that point, right. It could have been

(01:05:59):
an interesting point because I feel like that scene with
the detective, there's just like so much going on there.
But I feel like one of the reasons that he
lets Jake go other than the fact that he doesn't
care about women experiencing harassment and murder obviously, is that
he is, you know, like many cops and just many

(01:06:20):
people in general. He's like, well, normally I would go
after the husband on this one, but you said that
it was an indigenous man, and I believe that. And
it's like, well, why do you believe that even though
there's literally no proof of it, because cops are racist,
And it's like that could have been a point that
the movie could have made, but it isn't because it's

(01:06:41):
like everyone I kept wanting to think that this could
be making some sort of commentary, but it's just like
it just never ever was because when you hear that
character being referred to as the Indian, it's accepted as
a truth across the movie, across the cake, to the
point where like even the guy wearing this mask refers

(01:07:05):
to himself as the Indian, and so you're just like, Okay,
so this is just something that the writers of the
movie believe. Is like, it's it's not making a point
that like this character is racist, and that is why
this is being accepted as the truth. It's just like
perpetuating a racist Trump, but like, yeah, you're right there,

(01:07:28):
they didn't give it a reason. Like the movie as
it is now, there is no reason he needs to
be Indian, not that he needs a reason, but if
he was, if it was pointed out to be a
larger commentary, at least there would be like an indication
of why they even had to make him not white
or something. But the fact that it's just like sprinkled
in and just presented as yeah, like you said, like

(01:07:49):
all the characters think it's truth immediately, no one questions it.
It's just so disturbing. I just it's almost as if
like the writers just think this is true. Yeah, the
movie is operating on the assumption and that the audience
will have no trouble believing that, yeah, some random stalker
guy unknown to the victim is just peeping on her,

(01:08:11):
stalking her, and then will later kill her because he
is non white, and it's just like would have been true.
Like it's so I just I mean, I'm just speaking
of like the races of ofies America. Like I'm just saying,
like I don't even think that this would have been
a particularly offensive take in right, right, And yeah, I

(01:08:37):
think the movie is just operating on that. Well, of
course the audience will be like, yeah, it was this right,
like he did witness this, you know, this indigenous man
murdering this woman, because that's how little audiences of the
eighties thought of non white people. So that fucking sucks.

(01:08:59):
I apologize for me. Just watch this movie. I just
need to say that I had no idea what this
was about. I just thought it would be a fun ride.
I mean, I mean, maybe it was worth it for
that poor musical scene. But no, don't apologize. I mean
we were going to cover it eventually, and we've gotten
this request a bunch of times. It's always kind of

(01:09:19):
fun when we cover a movie from our popular request
list and then we immediately realize why people have been
requesting it because they're like, oh, they're gonna hate this.
You're like, oh, that's not nice. But yeah, we sure did.
We sure did hate it. I mean, my curiosity is satisfied.
I've been curious about this movie. I know what it
is now, and I will forget about it, hopefully in

(01:09:41):
a week, you know what I mean, Like, I, yeah, fortunately,
I don't think this movie is going to stick with me. No, Yeah,
does anyone have anything else they want to talk about.
Um No, But I mean to your point, though, it
is nice to watch a movie that was not bad
and then immediately talk about how much how bad it
is what other people? You know what I mean? Like,

(01:10:01):
it's like a nice to like bash a movie and
then move on. Other than it's sitting with you and
lingering thank you for the podcast, is what I'm saying.
I love hating movies. It's I love hating movies almost
almost as much as I love loving movies. So I'm
not mad about this. I love watching a terrible movie

(01:10:23):
that I hated and absolutely dunking on it. So Melanie
Griffith deserved so much better, truly bless her. Yeah, And
so this movie, like it's is also I think, an
entirely white movie on top of having a very racist
plot point. I don't think I saw anyone who wasn't
white in Los Angeles on the set. There's one black

(01:10:45):
guy that drags him out at the coffin and he's like, oh,
get rid of this person. And the black guy is
just like obedient and follows the raising a crew member,
which I thought was just like, this is the one
person of color you put in here? And he's just like,
I don't know, barely has lines and that he's forgotten about. Yeah,
so I just yeah, like this just feels like all

(01:11:06):
the bad tropes associated with this era of filmmaking plus more,
which is wild. I really hated this movie and it
doesn't pass the Buckteal test. There is a scene where
two women and I think the other woman is named
it's that scene where Jake is with Hollybody. They run
into another actor that Jake has met and worked with before.

(01:11:28):
They do talk to each other about like a role,
but there's a misunderstanding because Holly thinks that the other
woman is another porn star. This other actor is a
non porn actor and thinks that Holly is a non
porn actor and they but they never it never gets
cleared up, but they do talk, and I would probably

(01:11:49):
completely forgot about that. Oh no, does that mean it passes.
I think it might pass because they talk about like
movies and acting and roles and stuff. A man gets mentioned,
and they're also like, I'm so mad that this passes.
But it's also like a woman who's we only see
in that one scene. Also, you could cut that scene
from the movie and it wouldn't really, it wouldn't make

(01:12:11):
a difference. You could cut that scene. Yeah, so it's
I guess you could make the argument, but I still
say it does also vibes. Sometimes you make a vibes exception.
But also like, even if this does pass, it doesn't
mean that the movie is like any better or a
feminist masterpiece or anything like that. It just means that

(01:12:35):
I don't want to give it anything. Just means that
Brian to Palma gave one more woman three lines and
called it a day. Yeah, it's like and I and
and that's inclusion and let me pat myself on the
back about it. Progressive hero Brian de Palma, she has
darker hair. So diversity is a girl as a woman
with darker hair. That's what that is. Um, So that's

(01:12:59):
a that's the back, Dilton. How about our nipple scale
where we rate the movie? You saw a lot of
nipples in this movie too. We do see a lot
of nipples, and yet I don't have any for it. No,
because we write the movie on a scale of zero
to five nipples based on how we think the movie
does when looking at it through an intersectional feminist lens.

(01:13:22):
And I I would give this movie zero nipples same
because of everything we've talked about, it's just a movie
that sort of revels in a woman being stalked and
peeped on and murdered and again more male gaze cinematography

(01:13:44):
than I've seen in any other movie. And that's like,
that's a bar to clear. That is a bar to clear.
It's all like leering shots, like the longest shot I've
ever seen on a boob, like it just I just
I've never had so much attention on on boob for
so long. And it is like a very like headless

(01:14:04):
woman of Hollywood thing where even though we see that
woman's face briefly, it does like tilt down to her
chest and lingers there for a very long time. And
then the whole rest of the movie is just a
woman being leered at through a telescope or a woman
being stalked, or a woman being lied to. And that's

(01:14:25):
the premise of the movie. And it's because it's like
we have like and this is not like an indictment
against movies with erotic themes. There's plenty of like erotic
movies that fucking rule. It's just like the way it's
bound framed and who's looking at it? Yeah, we just
covered bound that that's an erotic movie. The fucking rules.
That movie's really fun, but it's like, yeah, it's all

(01:14:48):
about like who is looking what are they looking at?
And is their consent implied? And in this movie is
like no, no, no, no, no, all the way across
the board. So that sucks and it's racist and Ura
Nipples and I hated it. Zero nipples really had an
unfortunate time. I want to give it a half nipple
only for Melanie Griffith and like her. I did like

(01:15:09):
her character. Yeah, it wasn't totally terrible, but that she's
the only reason I would even consider giving this movie
any praise. It's bad. It is a bad movie. Yeah.
And it's so long. It felt it so long. It's
very and it feels longer than it is because so
much of it is just like boring shots of a
woman being like people walking and one person following another

(01:15:33):
person while they're both walking, and it's like snooze. The
last thing I'll say is that uh diploma did want
a porn actress to play the part of Holly originally,
which I think is like actually pretty interesting, but then
the producers Slash Studio were like, absolutely not, we won't

(01:15:56):
release the movie, which is just like another indication of
the added towards porn actors at this time. Um, but
he did have someone in mind, and like, I guess
like I had the idea for this movie when he
was interviewing Janice Dickinson's body double from UM, what's that
movie that we were talking about that's really really transphobic

(01:16:17):
and dressed to kill? Dressed to kill? Um, But yeah,
he did want to cast a porn actor, but then
um Mr Hollywood said no, No. I'm honestly surprised that
in Body Double, Melanie Griffith's character wasn't written to also
be in on this like murderous scheme, which is something

(01:16:38):
that would have like further demonized, you know, sex work
and porn work and stuff. And I'm I'm surprised that
didn't happen, which is just indicative of how movies like this,
especially from this era, viewed sex work and pornography. And
then I think it is like a little complicated by
the fact that because Jake is so awful, but the

(01:17:01):
movie doesn't think Jake is awful, and Jake ends up
becoming a porn actor. So I feel like the movie
isn't anti porn really like but but that's like a
fucking weird math problem that I don't really want to do.
Absolute last thing because I thought this was funny. I
was like, was this movie nominated for any awards? And
I feel like there was some justice here because Di

(01:17:23):
Palma was nominated for the Golden Raspberry Award for Worst Director,
Oh my god for this movie. Yes, and Melanie Griffith
was nominated for a Golden Globe okay for playing Hollie.
That is justice. Yeah, so I was like, Okay, this
movie has like a seventy six on Rotten Tomatoes, but
it also really was a flop at the box office,

(01:17:45):
so that makes me feel good. Yeah, I don't think
it's I think it is like a hot take to
like this movie then and now, um, and we we
don't have a hot take, and I think we have
the general take, which is that, um, I don't want
to ever think about it again. Chervine, thank you so
much for coming back and breaking because this movie. Oh

(01:18:07):
you're so welcome, Jamie and Caitlin. This was fun though.
Thanks for thanks for having me back. I'll come back anytime.
Maybe I won't choose the movie, but no, this was good.
I'm glad that we got to vent about it because
I had so many I had watched it last night
and I was just like having so many thoughts and
I was like, what was that? What did I just see? It? Is?

(01:18:28):
It is very cathartic to air your grievances about a
movie that you hate. It really was, and I feel
like now we can forget about Brian to Palmer for
another two years exactly, and that's always a blessing. Where
can people follow you online and check out your stuff
and plug away? I'm on social media Twitter and Instagram.

(01:18:52):
My Twitter is shiro Hero six six six in my
Instagram is just Shiro Hero. I'm making a very big
effort and I'm doing really well and not being online
very much, so I'm really looming a lot of things.
But I occasionally post up here and there if I'm
spiraling and depressed. So come along join the ride. You

(01:19:14):
can follow us on those places as well, Instagram and
Twitter at Bechtel Cast. You can subscribe to our Patreon
a k a. Matreon where we do to bonus episodes
every single month, plus access to our our back catalog
of one hundred over one hundred episodes. This month, it's

(01:19:36):
Minions March Baby, and you know what that means. We're
covering Despicable Me and the Forty year Old Virgin, So
it's actually, um there's two options. You can call it
Medians March, or you can call it Gruella Steville. Or
you can call it Corrella Steville because it's Steve Correll
playing um fucked up people. So that so if that

(01:20:01):
doesn't sell you on it, I don't know what will will.
You can also get our verch at t public dot
com slash the Bechtel Cast, and if you guys don't mind,
I'm going to actually have my body double switch in
for the next episode. Uh. They sound exactly like me,
but but they're not me. So it's like a voice

(01:20:23):
double too. It's my voice double. Yeah yeah yeah cool
cool yeah, Well I look by