Valentine's Day (2010)

We're releasing an episode a day early this week because it's Valentine's Day (the day) and it's Valentine's Day (the movie).

Next Bechdel Cast Tour is in the UK in May! Grab tickets at linktr.ee/bechdelcast

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Burn attention Beck to cast listeners.

Speaker 2 (00:05):
We're going on tour.

Speaker 1 (00:07):
We really are. And it's not just any tour. It's
a tour in the UK and it's a tour where
we are covering Titanic and.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Shrek brilliantly titled the Shrek Tannic Tour. Yes, Shrek Tornic.
We're working on it. There's a couple there's a couple
months before the tour, but yes, we're really excited. We're
currently doing five shows in the UK, with more shows
to be added. Stay tuned at the end of May.

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Yes, starting with two shows in London on May twenty second,
once at six point thirty that's a Shrek show, one
at nine pm that is a Titanic show. Then we
are scooting over to Oxford on May twenty fourth we
are covering Titanic. Okay, Then we're scooting up to Edinburgh

(00:59):
on May twenty sixth and doing Shtrek.

Speaker 2 (01:02):
If you're a Scottish Titanic fan, you are going to
have to commute. And I know that that's not but listen, yeah,
you live in Edinburgh recovering Shrek.

Speaker 1 (01:14):
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, but also you're welcome. And then
if you do want to see Titanic somewhere nearby, you
can head down to Manchester. We're doing a show on
May twenty eighth, and that's a Titanic show. So yeah,
you're just gonna want to come to kind of all
of them if you live in the UK, if you

(01:35):
live kind of anywhere in Europe, or sort of just
anywhere in the world.

Speaker 2 (01:39):
As your Bechdel Cast allies in the US can attest to.
Our live shows are super fun. It is like a
live episode plus a bunch of fun stuff. We dress up,
we bring audience members on stage sometimes we do. It's
just it's big and goofy and silly, and we're covering
two of our favorite movies that are Bechdel Cast can

(02:00):
and so we want to have a good time. We'll
be bringing exclusive merch and we will be doing meet
and greets before and after the show. We want to
meet everybody, and we're really really excited. And tickets are
already going fast because we released it to matrons first,
plugging the Patreon really quick.

Speaker 1 (02:20):
Little perk for the matrons.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Yep, So if you live in those areas, get those
dang tickets because these shows will sell out.

Speaker 1 (02:28):
Yes, they will, so head over to our link Tree
Link Tree slash Bechtel Cast. All the tickets are posted
there and like we said, we're working on at least
one more show in a different city, so stay tuned.
We're hoping to announce that soon and otherwise, grab your
tickets for the Shrek Tanic.

Speaker 2 (02:52):
And enjoy the episode.

Speaker 3 (02:54):
On the doodcast, the questions asked if movies have women
and are all the discussions just boyfriends and husbands or
do they have individualism? It's the patriarchy, zeph and Vast
start changing it with the Bechdel Cast.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
Happy Valentine, Jamie.

Speaker 2 (03:13):
No, Caitlin, I'm having and I hate Valentine's Day party?
And guess what. It's at a restaurant where, for some reason,
my party's double booked with a wedding reception. Sorry. Oh,
do you think they were gonna put up a curtain
or a partition between these two parties? No, the parties
are facing each other for some reason.

Speaker 1 (03:38):
Well, sounds like a nice time.

Speaker 2 (03:40):
Wait, what is the name of the god my brain
is gonna be confetti today? Romeo Midnight. That's the name
of the DJ. The DJ Gary Marshall's where he's like, hey,
all you Los Angeles fuckers, Like, who's ready to fuck?
It's Valentine's Day. You're like, lash, welcome to the Valentine's

(04:02):
Day episode.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
A day earlier than normal. Normally we release episodes on Thursdays.
But it's a special day. Today's Wednesday, and you're getting
a Valentine's Day episode early on the movie Valentine's Day Day.

Speaker 2 (04:16):
Good lord. I feel like this has to be the
last contemporary movie like this, right, the last. Gary Marshall
thinking that he's gonna read I mean, and may he
rest in peace. He made some.

Speaker 1 (04:28):
Good stuff, not this, but not in the past. Well,
he's dead decade and a half.

Speaker 2 (04:34):
Well, I mean, to be fair, Cale, he's been dead
for eight of those years since we will look you
sure God has asked though, No, I mean I love
Gary Marshall. I mean, for crying out loud, the man
directed the Princess Diaries. Like, let's be serious, and you
can tell he directed the Princess Diaries because there's three
Princess Diaries cast members in this movie.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
Wait, obviously Anne Hathaway, but who.

Speaker 2 (04:58):
Joe Hector Ellis, Oh yeah, Joe, just Joe. And this
one is harder but Paolo Putneska is also in this movie.

Speaker 1 (05:09):
Oh, he's at the Southwest gate at the airport being
like this counter is for oversized luggage only.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
Yeah, I mean, say what you will love about Gary Marshall,
including he's a legend and he's dead but and uh huh,
he's loyal to his character actors. He also made Happy Days.

Speaker 4 (05:29):
You know.

Speaker 2 (05:29):
It's like late Gary Marshall. For some reason, he spent
the last years of his career trying to realchemize love. Actually,
yes he did, and I'm realizing, Caitlin. Unfortunately, there is
one more that we have. It's not with this many
cast members, but there is a Gary Marshall movie called
Mother's Day. Oh well that was I believe his last

(05:54):
film credit brutal.

Speaker 1 (05:57):
I guess we've got something we have to cover in anyways.

Speaker 2 (06:01):
Anyway, So to be clear, we are fans of these
movies because they are some of the most fun episodes.

Speaker 1 (06:07):
Because we've already covered New Year's Eve, Yes, but Gary
Marshall ensemble cast movie from twenty eleven.

Speaker 2 (06:16):
Yeah, and then we've also covered Princess Diaries. That might
have been the only other Gary Marshall movie we've covered.

Speaker 1 (06:23):
Because we have not done Pretty Woman yet.

Speaker 2 (06:26):
No. Oh, he also has Pretty Woman loyalty in.

Speaker 1 (06:28):
This Julia Roberts is in the movie.

Speaker 2 (06:31):
I would say Julia Roberts is perhaps doing him a favor. God,
so many late twists in this movie. I can't wait.
I was writing down all of the twists at the
end where you're like, the twist is Bradley Cooper is gay.
The twist is Julia Roberts is not dead. The twist
is that the kid was in love with Jennifer Garner,
like you're just like, every twist more baffling than the last.

Speaker 1 (06:53):
Yeah. Oh.

Speaker 2 (06:53):
Also, Gary Marshall directed Overboard, which we haven't covered.

Speaker 1 (06:56):
We have not covered. We have covered Runaway Bride, which
we have he directed. Did he also not direct A
League of Their Own, which we have covered?

Speaker 2 (07:07):
No, that is a Penny Marshall movie. Oh, oh, silly me?

Speaker 1 (07:13):
How dare I wow erasing women's work classic Caitlin Durante?

Speaker 2 (07:17):
No, I mean? Which is another cool element of Gary Marshall.
Maybe the coolest thing about him is that he is
Penny Marshall's brother, and we love Penny Marshall, and heways like,
you know, part of a Hollywood dynasty. Has directed a
lot of great stuff, and also this movie that we're
covering today, I would be really curious, like outside of
trying to realchimize like make American Love actually over and over,

(07:41):
like what the motivation is. Maybe at some point in
your career, if you're getting older, you just want to
like have fun and hang out with all of your
cool Hollywood friends and the quality is not as important.
I don't know. I'm like kind of unbothered. I'm bothered
by a lot of specific things in this movie. Conceptually,

(08:03):
I do think that right now, now, more than ever,
there is a desire for smooth brained entertainment of this ILK. Yeah,
because life is hard.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
Life is so hard and we need an escape.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
But also watching this movie is hard, so it's challenging. Oh,
should we explain what the Bechtel test is? I guess
all right, all right, all right, we'll tell you what
this show is. You win. Also, my name is Jamie.

Speaker 1 (08:29):
And my name is Caitlin, and this is the Bechtel Cast,
where we examine movies through an intersectional feminist lens, using
the Bechtel test as a jumping off point. But Jamie,
what is that?

Speaker 2 (08:41):
Well, the Bechtel Test is a media metric created by
queer cartoonist Alison Bechdel, often called the Bechdel Wallace Test
due to it being created with Liz Wallace. It was
originally put into Bechtel's comic strip Dikes To Watch Out For.
It has since become kind of an iconic media metric

(09:03):
that has been used in a lot of things, including
this show. Sometimes at the end of every episode we
use it as a jumping off point for discussion. You
talk about larger intersectional issues today inside of the movie
Valentine's Day, I will say, you know, just leading with
this that this movie does pass the Bechdel Test.

Speaker 1 (09:25):
It does.

Speaker 2 (09:26):
The ways in which it passes are really weird. Sometimes
between Ann Hathaway and Queen Latifa talking about sports marketing,
it's such a rom comp thing sports marketing, You're just like, what, okay, okay, yes,
what is your history with Valentine's Day? Gary Marshall, twenty ten.

Speaker 1 (09:50):
You'll never believe this, but all I had seen this
movie before. I don't know what on earth would have
ever compelled me to watch it.

Speaker 2 (10:00):
Okay.

Speaker 1 (10:00):
I think it might have been because people were just
they were up in arms about the Taylor Latner and
Taylor Swift of it all.

Speaker 2 (10:10):
That's the main thing I remember from this was that
unbelievably effective marketing.

Speaker 1 (10:16):
Yes, but that still wouldn't have compelled me to watch
this movie because like, I like Taylor Swift, I think
she's talented, but I'm also like, I wouldn't call myself
a Swifty. I'm not enough of a fan to really
engage with her music that much, so that wouldn't even
been it. Like, I don't know why on earth I

(10:37):
would have ever watched this movie.

Speaker 2 (10:39):
But I did.

Speaker 1 (10:40):
But I didn't even know that until I started prepping
for this episode. I was like, wow, all of this
is familiar. I apparently watched this within the past three years. Why, though,
why did I do that? We'll never know?

Speaker 2 (10:52):
Why did you do that? Were you getting ready for her?
I Hate Valentine's Day Party? Sorry, of the many like hysteric,
baffling phrases that this script turns out, there's so many
good ones. The I Hate Valentine's Day Party is one
of my favorite ones because it's just like clunky, clunky, clunky,
and people keep saying, are you going to the I

(11:13):
Hate Valentine's Day Party? It's no I'm gay and I'm
gonna play. That's a pretty iconic line that happens in
this movie. It sure does, I mean talk about trailblazing.
I'm gay and I'm gonna play. I had an explosion
of emotion when he said I'm gay and I'm gonna play.
So you had seen this movie.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
I really had more than once, just that one time, okay,
and now twice more to prep for this episode. Love
it and I don't like that that's true about me?
What is your relationship with this movie?

Speaker 2 (11:49):
I didn't see this, but I was kind of surprised
because I was in high school when this movie came out,
Like theoretically I could have seen it, but I think
I got I remember specifically seeing He's just not that
into You, which is this same formula of a million
storylines that we have covered, and I think after I
saw that, I was like, I'm good on this format

(12:10):
and I just did not go to see this movie fair.
The thing I also remember about this movie was the
Taylor Taylor marketing Yes, which makes sense because they kind
of are the big millennial draw of this movie. It
like most of this cast appeals to Gen X, if

(12:31):
not boomers, with the casting. So it's like we had
the tailors. If you weren't hooked by the tailors.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
Maybe Ashton Kutcher would have brought you in if you
were a younger.

Speaker 2 (12:43):
Even then, it was like tofer Grace and Ashton Kutcher,
like that seventies show had kind of come and gone
at that point. I think it was over.

Speaker 1 (12:49):
Well definitely, But when I was in high school, I
was watching that seventy show. So if you're if you're
an elder millennial such as.

Speaker 2 (12:56):
Myself, maybe you would shot up for them.

Speaker 1 (12:58):
I would have maybe shown up for them.

Speaker 2 (13:00):
You have, you know, a lot of two thousands fixtures.
You have McDreamy, you have Jessica Alba, you have Jessica Beal.
I'm just gonna read off the cast really quick, just so,
and are you comfortable with I'm not gonna know what
the character names are.

Speaker 1 (13:15):
No, I okay, I did what I did last time
for the New Year's Eve episode. I'm using strictly actors'
names and zero characters.

Speaker 2 (13:23):
Names, although I am going to toss some of the
names out because they are the most rom commified gobbltycook ever.
Jessica Alba as Morley Clarkson, You're like, what is Yeah,
sorry about Morley Clarkson and sorry to all our Morley
Clarkson listeners out there, but that name is very fake.

Speaker 1 (13:42):
We have one million Morley Clarkson's who just unsubscribed, Like,
how dare you.

Speaker 2 (13:48):
Not all Morley's would break up with? Ashton Kutcher, Okay,
Jessica Alba, Kathy Bates, Jessica, Bill, Bradley Cooper, Eric Dane.
I don't remember who that is, but he's gay, he's
gonna play.

Speaker 1 (14:00):
Wait, we just covered a movie that he was in.
He's in Burlesque that we covered on the Matreon.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
I didn't know who he was then. I don't know
who he is now, with all due respect to him.
I guess he's on Euphoria, which I haven't watched.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
Oh, he's I think Jacob Ellerty's dad.

Speaker 2 (14:19):
We love that for him.

Speaker 1 (14:20):
Yeah, I've only seen one and a half episodes of
that show. And then I was like, this hurts my feelings.
I have to stop.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
I just simply didn't watch it. And if that makes
me old, I don't want to be young. Anyways. In
this movie, Eric Dane's gay, He's gonna play. Then we
have Patrick Dempsey, Hector, Elizondo aka Joe for Princess Diaries,
Jamie Fox, Jennifer Garner, tofer Grace and Hathaway, Ashton Kutcher,
Queen Latifah, Taylor Lowner, George Lopez, Shirley McLean. Really confusing,

(14:51):
assuming she was doing him a favor, assuming they've worked
together before. Emma Roberts, Julia Roberts and Taylor Swift. Wow,
five thousand people. It's one of those movies and we
don't like love actually no, and this is like, I
don't know. At least this one is like so smooth

(15:12):
brain that I'm like.

Speaker 1 (15:13):
Well, I don't know love actually, whether you like it
or not, at least it's like mostly coherent. This movie
is not.

Speaker 2 (15:23):
Yeah, I mean, I just love how incoherent this movie is.
I'm gonna give it five nipples no matter what.

Speaker 1 (15:29):
And I'm gonna give it negative five just to counteract.

Speaker 2 (15:32):
That, oh so much of this. They open with Morley Clarkson, well,
I guess it should be. Should we get into it? Yeah,
before you start the recap, I did just whatever. If
you're listening, you know the format of these movies. You
see little vignette. Every scene is forty five seconds long,
and something really dramatic happens in forty five seconds and

(15:52):
then they keep it pushing. Yeah, but like in this one,
it's the first three scenes you see are I believe,
three white hetero couples in bed and something important happens
while the man is standing up and the woman is
lying down.

Speaker 1 (16:06):
Oh, I didn't even there's no variety.

Speaker 2 (16:09):
There's no variety in what is happening in these seas.

Speaker 1 (16:12):
The second time I watched this movie, I was kind
of only just listening to the dialogue and not actually
looking at my screen because it's feels so visually uninteresting
and it doesn't really matter what's taking place on screen
because it's just like.

Speaker 2 (16:29):
Although sometimes there's good stuff though, like every time they
show the tailor swift bear, which looks to me not
to but like it looks like, I don't know why
I kept writing down like horcrux bear, Like it just
looks like something is something evil is inside of it.
And then they do this, like at the end of
the Incredible Story in between the Tailors, they end it

(16:51):
with like this lingering shot on the bear, and it
just kind of felt like Muthriagan to me. H Lotters
got camera's and the bear I'm calling it.

Speaker 1 (17:02):
I don't know when this movie's coming out, but there's
that movie Imaginary Okay. There are two movies coming out
this year that are both about imaginary friends. One is
like an animated movie for like children, okay, and one
is a horror movie where a little girl has a
little stuffed bear who her like demons spirit imaginary friend

(17:24):
lives inside and he like makes her do evil things.
And so it's kind of like that.

Speaker 2 (17:30):
Now we're talking. I love that shit. That's I think
that that is the energy I was getting from the
Taylor Lotder Taylor Swift bear, and also from the Taylor
Lotterer Taylor Swift relationship in general, which it's so like,
I'll go this is one of our goofy episodes that
we do every year. I'm gonna go ahead and plug
one of my favorite podcasts two Weekly and also Less

(17:51):
called Juristas, where they both discussed the recent resurgence of
Taylor Taylor. Because now, Taylor Lotner, I've said many times
on the show, he bought around at the chaw Chaw
Lounge once. That's not something you know someone who's doing
well would.

Speaker 1 (18:06):
Do or it's someone who's doing great.

Speaker 2 (18:11):
Here's the thing, though, would you I was talking about
this with friend of the show Melissa Lozada Oliva last night.
When you buy around for the bar at the chaw
Chaw Lounge on a Wednesday, you have effectively spent thirty
six dollars. So are you doing great? You know it's
not the baller move, it's it seems to be anyways,

(18:32):
all love to Taylor Lotner. But it's so wild because like,
Taylor Swift is forty times more famous than she was
when she was in this movie, and she was already
really famous. Yeah, and now Taylor Lotner like did a
backflip at a screening of the Taylor Swift Concert movie recently. Wow,
have you seen that video? No?

Speaker 1 (18:53):
I haven't.

Speaker 2 (18:54):
It's kind of awesome it, Like, I mean, all shade aside,
Taylor Londer is a very funny. He seems like a
good sport. But like, why did he go to the
AMC and do a backflip? Oh?

Speaker 1 (19:04):
He did it at the AMC.

Speaker 2 (19:07):
He did it just like around civilians. He just like
went to Burbank and did a backflip. And also everyone
was like, oh the Taylor Taylor relationship is even in
the blueper reel, and for some reason, I know it's
come up on this show. Before Taylor Lotner married a
woman named Taylor the Taylor's lot.

Speaker 1 (19:25):
Oh that's right.

Speaker 2 (19:27):
So he just seems I don't know, he seems maybe lovely,
but also like, what's going on with that guy? He
did a backflip at the AMC. That's all I'll say. Yeah,
that's the like varying levels of fame that they're at
these days. She's at like billionaire global pop star getting
regularly rightfully criticized for her carbon footprint. Famous. Taylor Lotner, meanwhile,

(19:51):
backflip at the AMC. Burbank awesome.

Speaker 1 (19:55):
And let's not forget the crime he committed by in
five I have Twilight Movies playing an indigenous character when
he is not indigenous.

Speaker 2 (20:06):
Yes, I mean I also still mainly blame the production
for that because he was like a teenager when he
started doing this.

Speaker 1 (20:12):
Yeah, many mistakes were made, but let's take a quick
break and then come back for the recap.

Speaker 2 (20:29):
And we're back. I am curious if I don't know
if Taylor Latner has ever commented on being cast as
a indigenous character. Down the line, because I do feel
like he has a responsibility to, you know, comment on
it at some point. You know, when you're a teenager,
it's like, Okay, the adults in the room need to
make the right decision and not cast him. But I

(20:52):
just wonder. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
Yeah, I will have to look into that. In any case.
Here is the recap for the movie Valentine's Day. Like
I mentioned, I will be referring to the characters as
their actors' names because there are one thousand characters and
zero of them are memorable. So yay, I'll be using
the actors' names. Okay. So the story takes place in

(21:18):
Los Angeles. Ever heard of it?

Speaker 2 (21:20):
Oh? Yeah?

Speaker 1 (21:21):
And guess what day it is?

Speaker 2 (21:23):
Oh, they won't stop reminding you.

Speaker 1 (21:26):
Is Valentine's Day. First we meet Ashton Kutcher. He proposes
to his girlfriend Jessica Alba, and she says yes, and
then he's like we yeah.

Speaker 2 (21:39):
This is the first scene where women in the bed,
guy out of the bed. Forty five second scene, something
critical happens. The baffling part of this scene is that
Jessica Alba has like perfect hair that is down when
she wakes up.

Speaker 1 (21:57):
And makeup perfect just everything. She's stunning.

Speaker 2 (22:01):
I mean, God, bless, I would like to live in
this world.

Speaker 1 (22:04):
Yeah, so Ashton Kutcher is so excited.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
To be engaged. Also, he's a florist.

Speaker 1 (22:11):
Yes, he goes to work. He's a florist. His colleague
is George Lopez, and they're doing lower stuff.

Speaker 2 (22:18):
George Lopez iconically is an authority on love and the
poetry of Roumy in this movie, and he also is
constantly referencing this wife that he's in love with, who
never speaks. At the very end she does appear correct,
but for most of the movie it again, just if
we're reframing this is a horror movie. I'm like, I

(22:40):
don't necessarily think this wife exists, and if she does,
I don't know that she's alive.

Speaker 1 (22:47):
Imaginary friend, more like imaginary wife. Where's that movie?

Speaker 2 (22:51):
Probably on tub?

Speaker 1 (22:52):
That movie is called The Joker Got Their Ass?

Speaker 2 (22:58):
Oh it?

Speaker 1 (23:03):
Oh okay. So then we meet Jamie Fox. He's a
sports journalist at a local news station and his boss,
Kathy Bates, wants him to cover Valentine's Day stories, even
though that's not his job.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
Kathy Bates was available for forty five minutes to shoot
this she is in two seeds that are in the
exact same location.

Speaker 1 (23:28):
Awesome, yeah, so cool. So Jamie Fox goes to the
flower market and ends up interviewing Ashton Kutcher.

Speaker 2 (23:38):
Sure, yes, not before something racist happens. But we'll get
back to those.

Speaker 1 (23:43):
Oh, we'll get there. Yeah. Then we meet Patrick Dempsey.
He is a doctor, not unlike his job on Gray's Anatomy. Right,
I've never seen that show.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
Yeah, they were not pushing him up.

Speaker 1 (23:58):
He is dating Jennifer Garner, but he can't spend Valentine's
Day with her because he has to fly to San
Francisco for a surgery or something. Then we meet tofer
Grace and Anne Hathaway another there you wake up in
bed together.

Speaker 2 (24:16):
Yes? Oh wait, I forgot to say. The interesting thing
about this scene with Patrick Dempsey and Jennifer Garner is
that she is eating an apple in bed first thing
in the morning.

Speaker 1 (24:29):
Well, that's to set up an amazing metaphor. Jamie, tell
me if you can understand this visual metaphor.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
I was hoping that this would come up organically. Please, yes,
here we go. So, in a number of scenes, we
see Patrick Dempsey's character juggling pieces of fruit and it's
to symbolize the fact that his character is also juggling
two different relationships, do you understand. I think it's really

(25:02):
important that they get the metaphor across exclusively by comparing
women to objects, to pieces of fruit at least, you know,
beautiful organic objects. The metaphor is not lost on me.
And also the stark visual of a woman eating an
apple in bed at seven in the morning, My gums

(25:24):
would be gushing. It would be being a blood bath.
So I just I love I love movie. I love
it movie. No one has gum disease in movie.

Speaker 1 (25:35):
Oh but they're too hot, they're too sexy. Okay, So
we meet Tofah Grace and Anne Hathaway. We find out
later that they've been dating for a couple weeks.

Speaker 2 (25:46):
The weird thing she's doing is taking polaroid pictures of
him in bed like a serial killer. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (25:53):
Anyway, they're smooching, but then she has to leave in
a big hurry because surprise, she is a phone sex
operator who needs to take a.

Speaker 2 (26:03):
Call, but she also has several other jobs. I mean,
this is like contextualized in the story, but just the
way it's ritten, and I get like this movie came
out during the recession. It was like badly written timely
commentary on.

Speaker 4 (26:22):
Like millennials trying to be adults in the world, but
it's hard. She's just like sneaking out of her job
at Queen Latifa World to loudly take the.

Speaker 2 (26:35):
Phone sex operator calls, and it was just like, this
is just not how it would go. Surely there's a
break room. She's like in front of Queen Latifa's door.

Speaker 1 (26:44):
Yes, I have a list of just like what the
fuck okay things that happened in this movie, and that
is on my list. I will perfect go over the
list later on love it. But yes, none of that
makes sense, not slick. No. So then we meet Shirley
McLain and Hector Elizondo. They have been married for many years.

(27:07):
They have a young grandson who goes to Ashton Kutcher's
flower shop to order roses for the girl at school
who he's in love with. Then we meet Julia Roberts
and Bradley Cooper. They are strangers sitting on a plane
next to each other headed to la She is in

(27:29):
the military, also is having a difficult time believing that
Julia Roberts would play a military person.

Speaker 2 (27:36):
Which I don't doubt her acting ability, but she just
does look like Julia Roberts, and I really loved I mean,
we're supposed to be thinking that Bradley and Julia are
going to get together for the whole baby and then
there's a twist at the end. But yeah, I have
written out thank you for serving Julia Roberts. And I

(27:56):
also really like there's like this scene between them where
she's like, I'm in the military, so I can tell
that you have trouble committing because you don't like heart
shaped candy. I was like, do they teach that in army?

Speaker 1 (28:15):
She's I think it's implied that she is in some
kind of like special forces.

Speaker 2 (28:21):
Yeah, it seems like she's doing war crimes. And she's like, listen,
the first thing you learn in Navy Seal's basic training
is what Bradley Cooper looks like when he's having trouble committing.

Speaker 1 (28:35):
It's so bizarre.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
I love it.

Speaker 1 (28:37):
Anyway, we learn that she's on a fourteen hour flight
from wherever she's coming from.

Speaker 2 (28:44):
I think that they keep it intentionally vague, super vague
to not imply her in any specific war crimes, right.

Speaker 1 (28:51):
Right, Yeah, And so she's on this fourteen hour flight
to spend only one day with her loved one, whoever
that might be.

Speaker 2 (28:59):
Bradley Cooper assumes they're fucking. Yes, Bradley Cooper bakes all
sorts of assumptions.

Speaker 1 (29:03):
For sure, and I'll talk more about that later, but anyway,
we get all that information. Then we cut back to
Jennifer Garner and Ashton Kutcher. They're best friends. Exhausting, he
encourages her to surprise Patrick Dempsey in San Francisco. But

(29:24):
this is when we learn that he was lying about
going to San Francisco and he actually has a wife
and a kid, which Jennifer Garner does not know about.

Speaker 2 (29:36):
He's a dog. Yes.

Speaker 1 (29:39):
Back to Anne Hathaway. So when she's not doing phone
sex work, she works for Queen Latifa, who is a
sports agent who reps a football player, Eric Dane, whose
career seems like it's on the decline. People are like,
is he going to retire?

Speaker 2 (30:00):
They keep calling him old. Yeah, yeah, I feel like
they're trying to make him like Tom Brady coated. Oh yeah,
but maybe that wasn't true, a twenty ten whatever. A
football player who people speculate his career is almost over.
But the twist is he's gay and he's gonna play.

Speaker 1 (30:17):
He's gay and he's gonna play.

Speaker 2 (30:20):
Yeah, I just love that line.

Speaker 1 (30:22):
Wow. So Queen Latifa and Eric Dane get together for
a meeting, along with his publicist Jessica Beale. So Jessica
has entered the.

Speaker 2 (30:32):
Chat and she is a mess.

Speaker 1 (30:34):
She's so neurotic.

Speaker 2 (30:35):
Good, we need to get her to a hospital. This
is like a really great just so bananas over the
top manic pixie dream girl taken to an extreme that
it does seem like she's not well.

Speaker 1 (30:51):
Yeah. Then we meet Emma Roberts. She is a high
school student who plans to have sex for the first
time with her boyfriend during their lunch period.

Speaker 2 (31:02):
Awesome Kristin Shall appearance where Kristin Shall plays a teacher
and Emma Roberts is like, I'm going to go fuck
right now and Christinshaw's like, oh, that's started the scene.
I enjoyed that jump scare. I thought it was fun. Also,
Emma Roberts is big like peak twenty ten in this
movie by only wearing really uncomfortable looking ballet flats in

(31:24):
every single scene.

Speaker 1 (31:26):
Oh true.

Speaker 2 (31:27):
Yeah, where it's like the kind of shoes where you
can see the knuckles of your toes. Oh nasty.

Speaker 1 (31:33):
Anyways, I was also wearing those in twenty ten.

Speaker 2 (31:36):
We all were, We were all flat footed barbies back then.

Speaker 1 (31:40):
Okay, So, also at this high school are Taylor Swift
and Taylor Lautner. They are dating. He has bought her
an enormous teddy bear that's haunted, that might have an
evil demon living inside of it.

Speaker 2 (31:52):
Yes, harkrks bear. Yes.

Speaker 1 (31:54):
Then Emma Robert's boyfriend goes to her house to prepare
for their sex that they're gonna have, and he takes
off his clothes, but Emma Robert's mom comes home and
catches him naked, so he runs outside still naked, and
we're like, ha ha, awesome comedy. Meanwhile, Ashton is so

(32:19):
annoying excited about being gay. He's so annoying. Jessica Alba, However,
his fiance, she's not as excited, and he doesn't seem
to notice anyway.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
I mean, honestly, fair like not to go back to
their first seed together. But again he wakes her up.
She's perfect because it's a movie. She's perfect. But the
first thing she says, hi, and then he launches in
and says, when I was a kid, most of the
advice my dad gave me was crap. I was like,
if you, as my boyfriend, are starting the day with that, no,

(32:55):
like good morning would be awesome.

Speaker 1 (32:58):
And then he proposes, and we don't see her actually
say yes. It almost seems like he just shoves the
ring on her finger and assumes the answer is.

Speaker 2 (33:07):
Yes, right, which at least is sort of commented on
later when she dumps his ass. But I just do
it like this is like a place where like love
actually actually does feel like way better paced, but because
so many scenes have to happen, it does feel like
there's like a bomb in the room that will go
off after seventy five seconds if they don't get all

(33:30):
this stuff out, like some of the scenes move. So
it for a movie where like nothing interesting happens. It's
really hard to watch these movies because so much is happening,
like you cannot look away, and they're two hours long.
So it's and you cast forty people.

Speaker 1 (33:46):
Right exactly? Okay, So Patrick Dempsey goes to Ashton Kutcher's
flower shop to buy flowers for both his wife, his
wife and his secret girlfriend, Jennifer Garner and Ashton Kutcher
is thinking to himself, hang on, that's my friend Jennifer Garner,
which means my friend's boyfriend is secretly married. So he

(34:10):
goes to Jennifer Garner's work, she's an elementary school teacher,
to try to tell her that her boyfriend is secretly married,
but he doesn't get a chance to tell her she
still doesn't know. Then Ashton goes home to his lady love,
Jessica Alba, to leave a Valentine's Day gift, but he

(34:31):
discovers that she's about to leave him. All of her
stuff is packed up, and she breaks up with him.

Speaker 2 (34:37):
And even his dog doesn't love him. It's kind of awesome.

Speaker 1 (34:42):
Brutal uugh, and he's like, damn well, I better go
stop Jennifer Garner from getting on that plane to San Francisco.
So he rushes to the airport. We get an extremely
rom com cliche running through the airport, but this time
it's not to stop the love of his life, it's
to stop a friend, and we're like, wow, subversive.

Speaker 2 (35:04):
But actually, I think the weirdest part of that scene
is that, like, it's such a well worn trope that
I was like, conditioning myself to be like, oh wow,
the movie's almost over, and then you look at the
run time you're like, it is like we're less than
halfway in at the airport run Seriously, I was like
overwhelmed with such relief and then dread that whole scene

(35:26):
is so long. We do get Paola Putnzka at least true.

Speaker 1 (35:30):
Yes, anyway, so he does tell her that her boyfriend
is married, but Jennifer Garner refuses to believe it and
she gets on the plane anyway, question Mark. I have
a lot of questions about that because the next time
we see her, she's in LA.

Speaker 2 (35:49):
I was so confused. I was like, did she get
off at San Francisco? But then you could hear a
nurse clearly say also a very funny bad line, Hello,
you've reached Los Angeles Hospital.

Speaker 1 (36:00):
As so you're like, not a real place.

Speaker 2 (36:02):
Well, I guess they are in LA. I would love
to reach Los Angeles Hospital.

Speaker 1 (36:09):
Yes, Okay, So none of that made sense either. Jamie
Foxx goes and tries to get an exclusive on Eric Dane,
the football player from Jessica Biale, who is upset because
she's single and she feels all alone.

Speaker 2 (36:26):
First of all, she's on the floor and he's like
is she good, and they're like, well, she's usually fine
on the Fourth of July and even Saint Patrick's Day,
but on Valentine's Day she is sad, which sucks. She
like looks dead, You're right, and then they.

Speaker 1 (36:43):
Fall in love and you're like, you're like sure, but anyway,
so yeah, she's upset, not only because she's single and
she feels lonely, but also no one has rsvped to her.
I hate Valentine's Day party.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
Which she's throwing at an Indian restaurant at this same
time as a wedding reception, which I'm just like, we've
got to call the restaurant because you do have to
pick one of those events. Yeah, and it's the wedding
because no one's coming to Jessica Biale's I Hate Valentine's
Day party.

Speaker 1 (37:16):
But then everyone shows.

Speaker 2 (37:17):
Up, including twenty people we've never met before, like majority
characters we do not know.

Speaker 1 (37:24):
Yes, anyway, She's like, I hate Valentine's Day, and Jamie
Fox is also like, I hate Valentine's Day.

Speaker 2 (37:31):
I wish I could just sports all day long, and
she's like, I wish I could sports all day long,
but I also crave love and he's like okay, and
then there's a big pratfall with a bunch of chocolates. Yes, disaster.

Speaker 1 (37:48):
Oh anyway, he leaves and then Eric Dane, the football player,
comes out as gay at a press conference.

Speaker 2 (37:57):
But what does he say.

Speaker 1 (37:58):
He's like, I'm gay and I'm gonna play.

Speaker 2 (38:02):
What a win?

Speaker 1 (38:03):
Well because everyone's like congratulations, good for you, But are
you retiring? Like that's what this press conference or supposed
to be.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
Yeah, he does come out instead of answering a question,
but then he expands because he's gay and he's going
to play. And I mean, as goofy as that scene is,
I was like, okay, twenty ten not bad? You know,
yeah you gay marriage was not legal in many places
at the time when this movie came out and was

(38:31):
tremendously successful. So can we chalk that legislation eventually passing
up to Eric Danes saying I'm gay and I'm gonna play.

Speaker 1 (38:40):
I think we obviously can.

Speaker 2 (38:42):
I think that it's certainly a big part. I don't know,
any inclusion in this movie is like very bare bones twenty.

Speaker 1 (38:49):
Ten's I mean, that's what most of my notes are
about because it's abysmal.

Speaker 2 (38:54):
Yeah, I'm sure that we have identical notes, but never
forget that he is gay and he's gonna play. But
when we let him kiss on screen, we.

Speaker 1 (39:05):
Won't no anyway. So then tofra Grace takes Anne Hathaway
to a Valentine's dinner where he discovers that she's a
phone sex worker and he's like, ooh, yucky, bye forever awesome.
Uh huh. Then Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner are at

(39:26):
gym class or track practice, We're not really sure, being
interviewed by a reporter.

Speaker 2 (39:34):
My boyfriend at this part of the movie got very
critical of a specific background actor who I then could
not stop looking at, not the reporter, the guy holding
the camera, or just like based on his energy. It's
just like so obviously not a real camera and not
on like it's not really pointing at anybody, and he's

(39:55):
sort of like slouching over. And I celebrate that background doctor.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
I love that. It's like when a movie where someone
like takes a sip from a mug that's clearly empty
and they like, don't the mechanics and physicality of drinking
are like.

Speaker 2 (40:11):
Just there's a couple of moments in this movie where
it's like, I don't think we've brought this up in
an episode in a while, but the sort of like
character with one line energy where it's very like sag
card please. There's a couple characters in here that have
huge sag card please energy about them. I love the
security guard at the airport who's like, Hi, I'm a

(40:32):
security guard. You're just like, give her her sagcard.

Speaker 1 (40:37):
She's like, put your shoes on. Ashton Kutcher, it's gross here.

Speaker 2 (40:42):
Great, but yeah, so it's I unfortunately know exactly enough
about Taylor Swift to know that a lot of what
they're saying in this scene where nothing happens is like
references to twenty ten era Taylor Swift and Taylor Lautner
where it's like, my favorite number is thirteen. I would
never take off my shirt.

Speaker 1 (41:00):
Like okay, okay. So then Shirley McClain reveals to her husband,
Hector Alizondo, that she had an affair with his business
partner some years ago.

Speaker 2 (41:15):
And also in this movie, she's Shirley McClain.

Speaker 1 (41:19):
It appears to be that she is, Yeah, she's just
playing herself.

Speaker 2 (41:24):
But she's named Estelle, but she's actually because later they
go to Hollywood Forever and they see a Shirley McLain
movie and he's like, that's my wife, right, Literally.

Speaker 1 (41:34):
Do you know what movie that was?

Speaker 5 (41:35):
No?

Speaker 2 (41:36):
I don't.

Speaker 1 (41:36):
I didn't either. So he's upset and he's, you know,
discovered that his wife, Charlie McLain, was unfaithful.

Speaker 2 (41:43):
He's straight and he's not gonna play.

Speaker 1 (41:47):
Exactly. So he goes to Hollywood Forever Cemetery by himself.
For any non LA listeners, that's a place that's a
real cemetery, but they do a bunch of movie screenings.
So he goes to watch a movie there that his wife,
Shirley McClain is in. So they're like watching a movie

(42:11):
from I don't know, the fifties or sixties.

Speaker 2 (42:14):
I guess the sixties, yes, And I wanted to figure
out I meant to, and then I apologize to our listeners.
I did not remember to follow through this because I
was like, it looked like the scene that they eventually
kiss in front of where Shirley, a younger Shirley McClain
is kissing another actor. It didn't seem like it was
like a really happy scene. Yeah, Like it seemed like
a sad goodbye kiss, not like a I'm getting back

(42:37):
together with Joe from the Princess Diaries.

Speaker 1 (42:40):
True, but that is what happens because Shirley McClain comes
to the cemetery to find him, and then she's like,
I'm sorry, but if you love me, you have to
love all the parts of me, even the cheater parts.
And he's like, you're right, okay.

Speaker 2 (42:56):
That I mean what a mess is like, first of all, no,
he doesn't, No, he doesn't. You had sex with his
best friend. He doesn't have to forgive you. And he's like, yes,
I do. I was wrong. You're like, when were you wrong?
I mean, I understand that she Let's take this story
really seriously. I was just struggling with it because it
was like, Okay, she said that she was lonely and

(43:17):
that he was away a lot, and I understand that
that level of spousal neglect will sometimes lead to infidelity, right,
but does he have to forgive her six hours later?
Good question or ever? And also the fact that Topher
Grace seems to think that that is like a one

(43:38):
to one with his situation, which is completely different, and
he is very much the villain of Yes. Anyways, I
liked the cape that Shirley maclain wears to her own movie.
If I was a movie star, I would show up
in a cape to my movies also and be really disruptive.

Speaker 1 (44:00):
Yeah, everyone's like down in front, and she's like, shut
the fuck up, I'm trying to kiss my husband.

Speaker 2 (44:05):
I think it's so weird that he just went ahead
and said he's married to Sholie McLean. And then she's like, Hi,
I'm a.

Speaker 1 (44:11):
Stelle anyway, will they kiss and make up? So everything's
fine there, and then Tilford Grace sees this and he
realizes that he judged Anne Hathaway and her job too harshly.

Speaker 2 (44:25):
He sure did.

Speaker 1 (44:26):
Meanwhile, Jennifer Garner gets confirmation that her boyfriend Patrick Dempsey
is married.

Speaker 2 (44:33):
Yeah, she goes to Los Angeles Hospital in San Francisco
and San Francisco find out, but she I guess she
just doesn't get on the plane and we're never told.

Speaker 1 (44:44):
But we see her go into the doorway to get
onto the plane.

Speaker 2 (44:49):
I know she just got off on the tarmac and
bought us. I don't understand. And then he said he
was going to do heart surgery in San Francisco. I don't.
I don't know any heart surgeons. And there's also like
a weird line he has at the beginning where he's like,
you know, doctors, we're always traveling. I was like, that's
not really the first thing I think of when I

(45:10):
think about doctors.

Speaker 3 (45:12):
Right.

Speaker 2 (45:12):
Anyways, I don't know what city she's in, but her
boyfriend does have a wife.

Speaker 1 (45:19):
Yeah, and she finds out where he's having dinner with
his wife.

Speaker 2 (45:24):
Oh yeah, another great fake name for something. It's like
Peepee Gardens or something, bistro gardens. You're just like, that's words. Yep,
taking the wife out to Pepee Gardens for our fifteenth anasy.

Speaker 1 (45:39):
Anyway, So Jennifer Garner goes to this restaurant and pretends
to be the server and she calls him out for
being a two timing cheater and he's like, oh no,
and then his wife is like, what's going on that?

Speaker 2 (45:54):
Yeah? Another very like weird. I mean, it's like, if
Jennifer Garner can't make something think charming, then you're in trouble.
But it's such a weird scene where she's talking about
like killing a pig or something. We get it, we
get it. Sure, Dinner at Pepe Gardens ruined. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (46:14):
Then Jennifer Garner goes to Jessica Bial's I Hate Valentine's
Day party where the little boy from earlier shows up
and professes his love for Jennifer Garner.

Speaker 2 (46:27):
Hate this twist because we've been led to believe, And
first of all, I'm like, why am I invested in
this nine year old's love life.

Speaker 1 (46:34):
They're clearly trying to replicate the Little Boy from Love
actually in his storyline where he loves one of his classmates,
so we think that same thing is happening here. But no, no, no,
The twist is he's in love with his adult teacher,
and I feel like it's almost implied that he's in
love with her because he misses his mom, who ends

(46:56):
up being Drea Roberts.

Speaker 2 (46:58):
Which it's like you could examine that dynamic in a
movie that's not this movie where it's like he's because
it's like whatever, kids get confused all this stuff. At
least she doesn't say anything really creepy, like I was
expecting her to, like one of those like call me
in ten years. You're like, anytime someone says that to
like an eight year old in a movie like Don't

(47:21):
Call Her in ten Years. Yeah, but that Secrets of
Events was really fun because these movies so desperately need
every character to be tangentially connected to someone else that
like Emma Roberts not for nothing, worst babysitter in the
history of babysitters. The kid gets kidnapped twice under her
view because the kid makes his teacher realize that she's

(47:45):
in love with Ashton Kutcher. Meanwhile, unbeknownst to Jennifer Garner,
Ashton Kutcher has just technically kidnapped this kid, yeah, and
driven him to the restaurant, which obviously this kid is
not at risk for a stranger danger. Apparently he's like,

(48:05):
I've met this florist. He could give me a ride,
And then Emma Roberts sees him and thinks he's being abducted,
which he kind of is, but then he's like, don't worry,
I'm a florist, and you're like what.

Speaker 1 (48:16):
And meanwhile, his grandparents are too busy kissing it at
the Hollywood Forever Cemetery to notice that he's missing.

Speaker 2 (48:24):
Well, in their defense, they did hire a babysitter. She
just is too horny to babysit. Yeah, they did hire
Emma Roberts, but she was so focused on fucking her
boyfriend at lunch.

Speaker 1 (48:37):
Her boyfriend who's the delivery driver at the restaurant where
the I hate Valentine's Day party is taking places. It's
all connected, all right. So then the little boy professes
his love for Jennifer Garner and she's like, well, what
about that girl who's your age, from your class, your friends,

(48:57):
but maybe that could turn into love. And this helps
her realize that maybe the person she has loved all
along is her best friend, Ashton Kutcher.

Speaker 2 (49:06):
Don't do it. Don't do it.

Speaker 1 (49:09):
And then this is when we start to get some
you know, tying up of these storylines where Emma Roberts
realizes she's not ready to have sex yet and she
tells her boyfriend and he's like, that's okay, we can
still make out and then they kiss.

Speaker 2 (49:24):
Amazing journey that they've been on.

Speaker 1 (49:28):
Then Julia Roberts and Bradley Cooper's plane lands in la
He gives her access to his private car so that
she can spend extra time with her loved one, who
he assumes is her husband, but it ends up being
her son, the little boy who loves Jennifer Garner.

Speaker 2 (49:46):
Wow, WHOA. I do feel like they bury the lead
of that big time where they talk about her as
if she is like dead. Yes, they do at the beginning.
The twist is she's not dead.

Speaker 1 (49:55):
She's Julia Roberts and she's in the military.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
She's Navy. The those Julia Roberts. I really I'm just
like she is getting back from doing something so evil,
catastrophically evil. Yes, but her son is so big. That's
she just ends with it. You're so big, You're so big. Anyways,
goodbye to those characters.

Speaker 1 (50:17):
Yes, goodbye to them. Then we find out that the
person Bradley Cooper is going to see is Eric Dane
because they're together, or they were, but they broke up.
But then Bradley Cooper saw him coming out publicly and
he's proud of him, so then they get back together
question mark.

Speaker 2 (50:37):
But again the timeline on that does not work out
at all, because we are led to believe that the
Eric Dane character comes out while Bradley Cooper is already
on the plane.

Speaker 1 (50:48):
For sure that yeah, one hundred percent, that's what happened.
So how did he know.

Speaker 2 (50:52):
Where was he going? How did he know? He was like,
if you don't come out on national television on Valentine's Day,
I'm dumping your ass and.

Speaker 1 (51:01):
I'm gonna get a flight to la just in case
that does happen.

Speaker 2 (51:05):
And like, what was his job and why was he
fourteen hours away by plane? I think he was also
doing war crimes because he has a lot of money.
I don't know. I think he's like an oil executive
or he's something like really quite evil. But anyways, they're
gay and they're gonna play and then it cuts away
in a very twenty ten move. It's like, oh wow,

(51:26):
two gay characters. They can't kiss, they can just be
near each other.

Speaker 1 (51:32):
They can lightly embrace. But that's it.

Speaker 2 (51:36):
Yeah, representation When I can't get that line out of
my mind. It's so funny.

Speaker 1 (51:42):
It's poetry, is what it is. Okay. Then tofra Grace
goes to Ann Hathaway and they make up. I'm gonna
gloss over this because I want to talk about it
later in the discussion. Yeah, disaster truly, she should dump
him seriously. Then Jamie Foxx and j Soca Bie'll get
together in what I feel might be the most contrived

(52:04):
storyline of them all. But they're kissing now.

Speaker 2 (52:08):
Yeah, they're kissing in front of a green screen.

Speaker 1 (52:12):
And then Jennifer Garner goes to Ashton Kutcher being like, Hey,
maybe we're in love, and then they kiss and it's
awkward and they're like, I don't know, but I don't know.
Maybe we can make this work. And that's how the
movie ends.

Speaker 2 (52:29):
Oh and then one more shot of the horcrucks bear.

Speaker 1 (52:33):
We mustn't forget.

Speaker 2 (52:34):
Taylor switches in an elevator and I think half of
she's in four scenes. Two scenes, she's in front of
the school, she's at the football field, and then she's
in the elevator two times. Her first scene is so
funny because she's just like talking to Jennifer Garner and
being annoying. Question work, Yeah, we'll get there anyways, that's
the movie. And then a thousand bloopers. Yeah, and then

(52:56):
it's finally over.

Speaker 1 (52:57):
It's finally over after two hours. Let's take another and
we'll come back to discuss, and we're back.

Speaker 2 (53:13):
Today was a fairy tale. There's also like original Taylor
Swift song to go with. It's true this movie was
so successful.

Speaker 1 (53:24):
I mean in the sense that it got a lot
of money at the box office. It had a fifty
two million dollar budget. It grossed two hundred and sixteen million.
Yes at the box office. A critical flop though.

Speaker 2 (53:36):
Oh, I mean goes with that saying this whole era
of not even just Gary Marshall, just this format, because
it's like he's just not that into you, same same deal.

Speaker 1 (53:45):
But when it's a drama like Crash, then it wins
an oscar for some reason, even though that movie is
peepee poop.

Speaker 2 (53:52):
Who I was saying, We just recorded our burlesque episode,
And I confess that I sometimes mix up Stanley Tucci
and Alan Cumming for a similar baffling. I often mix
up the movie Crash and Sideways. So I've been avoiding
watching Sideways for years for apparently no reason. I guess
it's a good movie, and I thought it was Crash,

(54:15):
which is a bad movie. But I just just like,
I don't want to why, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (54:21):
Well, anyway, let's talk about Valentine's Day.

Speaker 2 (54:24):
Jesus Christ. Okay, didn't like my little story, all right,
don't know, no, no, no, who do you want to
talk about first?

Speaker 1 (54:35):
Well, I guess I just want to make a broad
statement that in an ensemble movie like this, where there
are literally dozens of characters, it is very very easy
to have an incredibly diverse cast, but just does not
have a movie he doesn't do that. It largely centers white, straight, cis,

(54:58):
able bodied people who are traditionally attractive by Western beauty standards.

Speaker 2 (55:04):
Yeah, the characters who are not white generally don't have
the same love stories. I think the only characters that
have actual love stories are Jamie Fox right.

Speaker 1 (55:16):
I mean, for example, George Lopez is there to uplift
Ashton Kutcher's character. He does have sort of, but it's
not a love storyline. No, it's just a scene where
he kisses his wife for two seconds.

Speaker 2 (55:29):
And it's also so scary because they don't let her speak,
And I was like, right, what is it's really giving?
Like decoy wife? Yeah, it doesn't work like you're saying,
He's just there to read roomy poetry to Ashton Kutcher. Yeah,
and the same with like Queen Latifa is very much
like a supporting character comic relief who does not get

(55:50):
even an attempted storyline, amongst other things that are off
about that character. But yeah, for the most part, it's
like overwhelmingly like we're looking at white and white passing
couples who are bad for each other.

Speaker 1 (56:06):
Yeah, for sure, there is one queer couple. True, And
it feels as though the writer of the movie, who
is named Catherine Fugate, she also wrote New Year's Eve,
if I'm not mistake she did.

Speaker 2 (56:25):
She also wrote a Julia Styles movie I've never seen,
but I know as a kind of a millennial movie
called The Prince in Me. Haven't seen it.

Speaker 1 (56:33):
Oh yeah, I vaguely remember that. It feels like it's
just like, oh, we have a quota to phil we
need one gay couple so that everyone will shut up
about there not being enough queer representation.

Speaker 2 (56:47):
Well, it's really telling that the fact that there has
been a gay couple in the movie the whole time
is like a twist at the very end of the
exactly like the twist Bradley Cooper is gay because you're
supposed to. I think you're supposed to think the whole
time that he's going to end up with Julia Roberts,
for sure, because in movies like this, if you're sitting
next to each other, you have to get married.

Speaker 1 (57:07):
Yeah, exactly, but not the case here.

Speaker 2 (57:10):
Instead, all of the scenes between him and Julia Roberts
are incredibly weird because they're talking around this trope of
if you sit next to each other, you have to
get married, and then they're like, surprise, he's gay.

Speaker 1 (57:24):
The end that's framed as a twist. Also, Eric Dane
being gay is set up as another big reveal where
rather than the audience learning that he's gay early on
and then like we see him decide whether or not
to come out publicly because that would be a major choice,
especially for an American football player, where like that's an

(57:46):
extremely homophobic organization and you know, right, like it still is,
but we don't see that him coming out is treated
like a big twist, right, And that seems like it
only happens to set up a string of homophobic jokes
that Jamie Foxx will make later on during his sports

(58:07):
journalism broadcast.

Speaker 2 (58:09):
And it's like the fact that the jokes are framed
within the movie is like good natured and like, ultimately
he's supportive, but he's just gonna say a bunch of
homophobic stuff on TV and then be like, ah, just kidding, buddy,
I support you. You're just like it's so so dated
the way that the only queer couple of the movie,

(58:29):
which is like, this movie is so weirdly written that
everything was surprising to me because it wasn't actually set
up in anyway. So you're like, oh, okay, I guess
Julia Roberts is alive and that kid's mom. Huh, Yeah,
I know. I thought the entire I mean, it was
a very twenty ten attempt to include a gay character.

(58:52):
But yeah, every plot point is like, surprise, surprise, he's gay,
and we don't see them together for most of the movie.

Speaker 1 (59:00):
There's just like one ten second moment at the end
where they lightly embrace. Again, they're not allowed to kiss,
because heaven forbid, we had queer characters kissing on screen
in a movie in twenty ten.

Speaker 2 (59:11):
Which is like a conversation that was at least extent
to like twenty seventeen, with like Josh Gadd being like
a huge win for queer representation. I slow danced with
a man in the background of a scene and Beauty
and the Beast and you're just like, get out of here,
Josh Gadd.

Speaker 1 (59:28):
Anyways, Also, as we discussed, Bradley Cooper keeps talking to
Julie Roberts being like, Wow, that guy that you're in
love with romantically, who you're gonna go visit for one day.
What a lucky guy. And oh my gosh, wow.

Speaker 2 (59:42):
Why doesn't she just correct him?

Speaker 1 (59:44):
Why doesn't she correct him? And it's also just weird
that so he's like seemingly making an assumption that she's
seeing a romantic partner. It doesn't make any sense that
one of the few queer characters in the movie would
be making such a heteronormative assumption. Yeah, that doesn't track
to me.

Speaker 2 (01:00:01):
The whole thing doesn't make sense unless I'm like, I
guess we don't technically know if that character is closeted,
although we're led to believe that he isn't based on
how he reacts to like his partner coming out, because
I feel like the vibe is supposed to be like, no,
we can be together, right, But I don't know. Is
he like an out oil executive?

Speaker 1 (01:00:21):
We know nothing about him.

Speaker 2 (01:00:23):
I guess that that is the job I projected onto him.
But I do think I'm right for some reason.

Speaker 1 (01:00:28):
I mean, he has enough money to have a private
limo pick him up from the airport and take him anywhere.
He wants to go. The trouble is we don't know
enough about him or his relationship with Eric Dane. We
have to project all this stuff onto him because the
movie doesn't care enough about I mean any of the characters,
but especially this queer couple.

Speaker 2 (01:00:47):
Yeah, it's like it always feels pronounced in the one
relationship out of forty that is a queer relationship, and
it's like, I don't know, outside of existing, it's not
doing anything. This is just a general observation. This movie
like really goes willy nilly on like who gets the
last name and who doesn't. There's really no rhyme or reason.

(01:01:09):
Half the characters have full names. Half the characters don't.
Jessica Alba is Morley Clarkson, whereas Bradley Cooper is Holden. Yeah,
Jennifer Garner is Julia Fitzpatrick, whereas Tefer Grace is Jason.
We don't know. I liked that. That's a compliment I'm
gonna get. It's just like brain dead, you know. Yes,

(01:01:32):
so that's one relationship that is horrible. I mean, I
just wanted to sort of talk about the overall just
very like of the time twenty ten racism. That's present
in this movie at every opportunity. I feel like you
have what we were talking about earlier, which is that
the non white characters that are there generally don't get

(01:01:55):
the exhausting love story that we get for most of
the white characters in the story. And then there's like
stuff that's even more aggressive, like the character who works
at the florist shop and the family that runs the
Indian restaurant is just like so so so heavily stereotyped
that it feels like, yes, egregious for twenty ten, Like

(01:02:20):
it feels like it's like nineteen eighty two egregious movie
racism for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:02:26):
This movie is obsessed with jokes that are at the
expense of people who don't speak English as their first language.
There are a number of jokes to that effect. There's
stereotypes about LATINX people in La We see the like
George Lopez's cousin in his car and that's hilarious because
Ashton Kutcher drives in the car and it's all very tropy.

Speaker 2 (01:02:52):
Then there's an Asian character that works at the floral shop.
We don't even know where. It's just like a general
stereotyped Asian racist character, Like the movie doesn't give us
enough information to even it's ridiculous.

Speaker 1 (01:03:08):
Yeah, yeah, what happens there is Jamie Fox is interviewing him. Oh,
I'm thinking of another character. So there's another character where
James Fox is interviewing a man who works at like
the flower market, where floral shop owners.

Speaker 2 (01:03:21):
Go, oh, sorry, yes, but there is someone who also
works at them. But yeah, right, remember right, So it's
just racism all over the place, and I know we
have to reference it, it just feels deprossing to even give
it airtime. The character who works at Ashton Kutcher's flower
World or fucking whatever, it's another fake ass name where
it's like Santa Flowers or I don't even know, like

(01:03:44):
something ridiculous. But the character who works at the flower
shop is subjected to the same lazy joke about like
why don't you speak English. He's like yelling at a
Bulgarian woman for I had to learn English, so do you?
And then Ashton Kusher joins in on the fun. And

(01:04:06):
then also he's subjected to like homophobic tropes too, where
I feel like he's heavily queer coded and he's saying
that he knows every dressmaker in Las Vegas and then anyways,
you never see him again.

Speaker 1 (01:04:17):
True. Yeah, A lot of the humor of this movie,
or attempts at humor and comedy, come from just relying
on stereotypes, harmful, reductive stereotypes.

Speaker 2 (01:04:30):
Yeah, and the end, like a huge chunk of the
movie takes place at an Indian restaurant. The only character
that we really get to know Ish is the child
who is friends with Julia Roberts's son question Mark. We
know that she likes Frank Zappa. I don't know why
we know that, but we are told that. We are

(01:04:51):
told that, and there's just a lot of heavy, heavy stereotyping.
I don't even want to like.

Speaker 1 (01:04:58):
Yeah, it's bad, it's bad. On top of that, as
we mentioned again, there's so many opportunities for this to
be a far more diverse cast based solely on just
the number of characters, but we see very little diversity
in every regard. There's no body diversity, especially for the

(01:05:18):
characters who are afforded a romantic storyline. Yeah, none of
those characters are fat, none of those characters are disabled.
There are no trans or gender queer characters.

Speaker 2 (01:05:30):
Right, which is not shocking for the time this came out,
but I was like, on top of being just like
grossly negligent in any interest in any diversity in your cast,
I feel like we end up talking about this every
time we cover a movie like this. It also makes
a movie really confusing to watch because it's a lot
of like white women with straight brown hair, and you're

(01:05:54):
just like, you know, it's not even a dig to
the actors, but there was a few moments where I
was like, wait, did that up in Anne Hathaway's character
or Jennifer Carter's character, Like they have the same hairstyle,
everyone's the same age. It is really confusing, certainly, and
also because it's like impossible to get invested or root
for any of these coupls that you're just like, who

(01:06:16):
is this?

Speaker 1 (01:06:17):
Who is anybody? There is one couple who are seniors
in Shirley maclain and Hector Elizondo. I was surprised because
older people's romantic life is rarely included in movies. It
is a story about people who are already together, rather
than like an older person meeting another older person and

(01:06:40):
finding love. That is something that's largely ignored and rarely
shown on.

Speaker 2 (01:06:46):
Screen until the Jane Fonda assance of the last five
to ten years. So it's like those movies do exist,
but yeah, this movie has no interest in it. I
was sort of I was back and forth on that
because it's all nonsense, right, But you're like, at least
they were given a genuine conflict, like it wasn't just
like we're old, because I feel like sometimes you know,

(01:07:07):
like grandparent characters are just there for comic relief or
just like for sure, especially in these kinds of comedies.
I mean, and also, it would just be really insulting
to those two, like really successful actors to give them nothing.
So they're given a solid conflict, but that it like
also it doesn't go anywhere because that she just shows
up in a cape and she's like, you have to

(01:07:28):
forgive me, and he's like, oh, okay, all right, and
then they're back together, yes whatever. So that one is bad.
We have who else? We have? Jamie Fox and Jessica Biale,
this couple, I agree. I mean, they're all so flimsy,
but these two are really I guess they do. I

(01:07:50):
will say they have more in common than some of
the couples. I'm happier for them than I am for
Tofa Grace a Dane Hathaway. They both like sports and
they I hate Valentine's Day. I think they're gonna make it.

Speaker 1 (01:08:03):
That is true. Is that the basis for a relationship. Well,
we just see them kiss. We don't know what happens
after that. But I mean, the bottom line in a
movie like this is fine, an ensemble cast with vignettes,
it can work, but you need fewer characters basically to
allow any of them to have any real depth or characterization.

(01:08:25):
But instead there's forty eight million characters in this movie,
and so they're all completely glossed over and given very
little characterization, very little context. Yeah, the nature of the
relationships is super glossed over, right, It's all messy, But
this one feels especially vague and like real.

Speaker 2 (01:08:44):
I guess it didn't stick out to be as vague
er than the other ones. That's true, but I just
I think I was so actively it's like one of
the only interracial couples in the movie. And then outside
of that, I was like, yeah, they basically have nothing
in common and the actors have no chemistry, but like,
which actors in this movie do?

Speaker 1 (01:09:02):
Oooh, that's very true.

Speaker 2 (01:09:04):
I feel like it equal opportunity fucking sucked. I don't
know I should have ranked the couples in order of
how little I was rooting for them. I feel like
they are in the upper fifty percent ale for me
because at least they hate Valentine's Day and love sport.

Speaker 1 (01:09:20):
That is more context than we get for a lot
of the couples. It's true. I would say the storyline
that I simultaneously hated the most and the least. Ooh,
for reasons all explain right now. Okay, was the tof
for Grace and Anne Hathaway story.

Speaker 2 (01:09:37):
Oh, that one is brutal. I also just wanted to
quickly say, because this movie bears a lot of resemblance
to He's Just Not That into You, two of the
same story by credits go to Catherine Fuguet and then
Abby Cone and Mark Silverstein, who also wrote He's Just
Not That Into You. So it's all the same. It's
all the same.

Speaker 1 (01:09:57):
Movie, It truly is. Okay, So the Tofer Grace anne
Hathaway storyline, the beats are that they've been dating for
a couple of weeks. He does not know at first
that she works part time as an adult phone entertainer,
he finds out he doesn't like it, and he breaks
up with her because of it. Then he realizes his

(01:10:17):
mistake after hearing other characters talk about how when you
love someone you have to love all of them, even
their gross parts, and so he shows up at Anne
Hathaway's apartment to try to win her back, and ultimately
it works. The reason I like it or I like
kind of what happens here is based on a few
lines of dialogue where Anne Hathaway says, I feel bad

(01:10:39):
about how you found out about my job. That was awkward,
but that's the only thing I'm going to apologize for,
implying that she's not going to apologize for doing phone
sex work, nor is she going to stop.

Speaker 2 (01:10:52):
But the big problem is that she then forgives him.
I don't because they've been dating for two weeks. Right,
get out of there.

Speaker 1 (01:11:02):
Yeah, you have an easy out.

Speaker 2 (01:11:03):
He's not a tolerant person. Get out of no's.

Speaker 1 (01:11:06):
And she says that, like she says, when you found
out something about me that you didn't like, you judged
me and bailed, And that's not a promising foundation for
a relationship. I feel like that's the most meaningful analysis
we get of romance in the entire movie that's otherwise
about absolutely nothing, right.

Speaker 2 (01:11:24):
But that was why I think this is a relationship.
I kind of hate the most because it's like, it
gets so close to saying something, but then in the
next two seconds it undercuts that completely. She's like, yes,
but I forgive you and I want to make love
to my boyfriend. I was like, you guys have been
together for two weeks. Two weeks.

Speaker 1 (01:11:43):
Well. The reason I hate it so much is because
of the implication that he only decides to get back
together with her after learning that when you love someone,
you have to love the gross parts about them, implying
that her doing sex work is one of the gross
things about her that he has to learn to love, right,
So the whole thing just sucks.

Speaker 2 (01:12:04):
And then on top of that, I was also frustrated
by the implication that I mean this felt less actively.
I don't think that the writers were like actively trying
to imply this, but because the cultural dismissal of sex
work is so prevalent that when Anne Hathaway introduces this information,

(01:12:24):
first of all, like she's hiding it from people because
she doesn't want to be judged, which makes sense to
me to the extent that like, society is very hostile
towards sex workers, but it also is implied that she
is ashamed of it and the only reason that she's
doing it is because she's in debt, which can be true,
but again it just felt like a very underthought, like, well,

(01:12:46):
the only reason that we are rooting for this character
is because she doesn't actually want to do this forever,
Like she just wants to do it until she's out
of debt and then she'll stop and get a quote
unquote regular job, which it did seem like what the
implication was was like I appreciated that she was unapologetic
about it and that she's like I'm going to keep
doing it, like fuck you, I need this job, but

(01:13:10):
I feel like it also is like but as soon
as I don't have to do it, I will not
because it's I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:13:16):
It just felt like a very like no, I got
that too.

Speaker 2 (01:13:18):
Yeah, And then she says one of the worst lines
in the movie, which is Sugar can't answer the phone
right now, she's got to make love to her boyfriend
on Valentine's Day, which literally turned my stomach. He also
so her the thing she's doing in bed at the
beginning is taking the scary polaroids he's kept them and
turns them into a murderer card and like tapes them

(01:13:42):
all on a piece of construction of paper like a
six year old and is like, take me back. And
I'm just like, he's gotta go, He's gotta go, get
him out.

Speaker 1 (01:13:50):
All of these people have to go.

Speaker 2 (01:13:53):
Yeah, I'm rooting for Anne Hathaway's character. I do think
that she needs to find another room and Queen Latifa
Sports Agency to take the calls.

Speaker 1 (01:14:04):
Okay, not only is she taking the calls at her
other job, which like whatever, I've definitely worked, yeah, one
job while I was at my other job.

Speaker 2 (01:14:14):
Yeah, but she gotta be smooth about it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:16):
You gotta be smooth about it. And she's not only
taking those calls at this office where she works, but
she's using the office phone a lot of the time
and not her private cell phone.

Speaker 2 (01:14:29):
And she also is like sort of lightly implied that
Queen Latifa is like picking up and listen listening, But
she's just like what Queen Latifa's character. Not only I
mean we already discussed the fact that I mean, as
with many of the non white characters in this movie.
She there's no suggestion or interest in giving her a storyline.

(01:14:52):
I believe she's the only black woman in the movie. Yeah,
and they give her nothing. Uh wull they do give
her is really weird. She Yeah, she makes a very
dated comment about bipolar in her first line, and then
everything she says is just kind of like vaguely like

(01:15:14):
girl Boss soup talk, where she's like, I have to business.
My football is gay, Like you're just like what.

Speaker 1 (01:15:23):
Also, the thing that they have her say toward the
end of the movie, when she takes up a phone
call that's intended for Anne Hathaway because it's another phone
sex call, Queen Latifa assumes the role of adult phone
entertainer and then says something just very racially charged and

(01:15:47):
just icky. And I felt so embarrassed that Queen Latifa
had to do that, and.

Speaker 2 (01:15:54):
That like three white writers put that together. Yeah, I
just pray to God that that was like bad prov
on her part and like not, I don't know, yeah,
that was she's given simply nothing to do. I'm like,
she's I don't know, but I mean, if you look
at everyone in this movie, the Queen Latifa at this
point is Oscar nominated Jamie Fox has an Oscar no

(01:16:14):
idea like did he want a boat? We don't know
who knows why anyone is here? Who else is there?
I guess oh, Jennifer Garner, Ashton Kutcher.

Speaker 1 (01:16:27):
I feel like some of these storylines aren't even worth Like,
I kind.

Speaker 2 (01:16:31):
Of feel like I have nothing to say about that, right.

Speaker 1 (01:16:37):
A lot of my comments are just sort of broader
in the sense that, like, for example, the way class
is handled in this movie. Every character seems to be
middle class, upper middle class. Yeah, there's no romance shown
between two poor people. That's another thing that's rarely seen
in movies in general. Or if there is a poor

(01:17:00):
person who falls in love, it's almost always them getting
with a rich person a La Titanic, Allah, Woman's true
stories like that, but very rarely do we see a
romantic storyline between two characters who are poor and stay poor.

Speaker 2 (01:17:21):
Now, that's just like that didn't even occur to me,
because we've covered so many movies like this where you're like, yeah,
I would have been truly shocked if that it happens.
The whole movie seems to take place like in West La, Like, yeah,
it's such a bummer.

Speaker 1 (01:17:36):
And then the other thing is like this, and I
get that this is a movie about Valentine's Day, which
centers on romantic love, so it's gonna be stories that
focus on romantic love, but it's also a very narrow
view of romantic love. Again, Like, it would have been
very shocking if a movie in twenty ten would have

(01:17:57):
included anything that wasn't you know, a cis hetero monogamous
love story. But like, I guess I just want to
see more stories where there are romantic storylines between polyamorous
people kink stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:18:13):
Yeah, where with the furries?

Speaker 1 (01:18:15):
Where with the furries? Where are the people who were
just kind of dating casually and who just want right
a fling or a one night stand or friends with benefits?
Like all of these stories are about people who were
in very serious, committed relationships or like falling deeply in
love and you know stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (01:18:31):
That was the thought that I had about the Jessica Bale. Yeah,
like these are all super monogamous relationships. And I feel
like there was basically no public discourse about anything other
than monogamous relationships when this movie came out. It's like
it is pretty bleak that like the way Jessica Biel's
character is acting, which is like she's like ready for
Death's sweet Embrace, is like a more plausible character than

(01:18:55):
someone who's dating casually. Like it's just like really depressing
that this person who doesn't exist is put there instead
of someone who you know very much existed in twenty ten.
Like it's yeah, but this movie is basically like Hallmark propaganda.
You know. It's like people don't buy Christmas ornaments for

(01:19:17):
people they're casually dating, so that is useless to Gary's
goal here. I don't know. I mean, yeah, it is
like frustrating, but it's also like it' Valentine's Day twenty ten.
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (01:19:34):
So I will say that this movie does appear to
try to subvert some things. All of these subversions are
very surface level. They go nowhere. Nothing very meaningful is
said about any of these things, but I did find it,
I guess interesting that, for example, with the Ashton Kutchure

(01:19:56):
Jessica Albo storyline, it is the man who appears to
be a hopeless romantic who's gushing about love, and the
woman who is the more stoic and not so obsessed
with romance. Usually you see the opposite in movies, especially
rom coms.

Speaker 2 (01:20:16):
I felt that too, but that it was also like
the way she was talking was so like weird. I
wish she had just been like I don't love you,
because it seemed like that was the issue, because I
felt like the undertone of what she was saying was like,
I love my career, so I cannot be married, right,
But that he's like, no, you could be married and
have a career, which is really brave of him to say.

Speaker 1 (01:20:38):
Well feminist icon Ashton Kutcher.

Speaker 2 (01:20:41):
Right, and he's wearing a pink shirt, which is a
twenty ten signifier for male feminists. That he's like, well,
what do you mean you can have a job and
be married to me. But then she's sort of instead
of saying I don't love you, is like no I can't,
and you're like, oh, okay, well whatever, bust of luck
to her with whatever her jobs, because of course we
don't know what it is. She is, like, the first
thing I thought about was my meeting at work, and

(01:21:03):
you're like, not your meeting at work.

Speaker 1 (01:21:05):
My meeting at my work job.

Speaker 2 (01:21:07):
I half expected her to show up at Queen Latifa industries,
but that was not the way it went. For as
little as we know about this character, I think it
is pretty awesome that she has a last name, which
is Clarkson, Morley.

Speaker 1 (01:21:19):
Clarkson, more clark from me.

Speaker 2 (01:21:21):
Yes, every realm common name. Sounds like your mouth is
full when you say it, just full of marbles, yeah,
carom on a hand. Another some version I think is
the Shirley Maclain Hector Elizonda's story where it's the woman
who has the affair. I feel like it's more common
to see a man cheating on his wife in movies. Yes,

(01:21:46):
And also it's more common for a man to demand
forgiveness and be immediately granted by the other character.

Speaker 1 (01:21:52):
Very true.

Speaker 2 (01:21:53):
So girls could do anything including gaslight they're spousal to
forgiving them for something pretty awful.

Speaker 1 (01:21:59):
Yep, exactly.

Speaker 2 (01:22:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:22:01):
Again, this movie does not have the purview to discuss
or examine any of these things meaningfully, but it did
show something which is the opposite of what you might expect.
I think the last one would be a hyper masculine
football player is gay and ready to play.

Speaker 5 (01:22:22):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:22:22):
That I felt like was a genuine attempt at as
a version, And we also talked about the flip side
of that of like the twist as He's gay happens
several times in this movie. I don't know. This movie
got nominated for a number of Teen Choice Awards and Razzies.
I wanted to single went out because I think the

(01:22:44):
Teen Choice Awards and the MTV Movie Awards and all
of this there's always like a real datedness to not
even the people nominated, but to the awards themselves. I
think that there should be, if there isn't already, there
could be a whole like doctoral thesis written about the
empty the award for Best Kiss where so many I mean,
I cover it in Lolita podcasts, where like a kiss

(01:23:06):
from Lolita was nominated for Best Kiss at the MTV
Movie Awards. Like, there's just all sorts of shit, but
the one that stood out to me is not a
I guess maybe I never watched the Teen Choice Awards.
I don't really know, but there is a award for
Choice Movie Colon hissy Fit. This award was given out

(01:23:27):
through twenty eighteen. It has since been discontinued, which is
really brave. The me Too movement, You know, it didn't
do nothing.

Speaker 5 (01:23:36):
It killed Teen Choice Award for Choice hissy Fit, but
I just wanted to shout out Jessica Bill was nominated.
She did not win Choice hissy Fit for a scene
where she lays on floor, so I just I don't
know that was such. And then there's of course, Taylor
Swift and Taylor Lotter were nominated for every kissing award
there was, and bravely they lost I'm pretty sure to

(01:23:58):
Kristen Stewart and Robert Patton. Whoa I know, double Taylor
Lautner snub brutal. I'm just looking at who's one.

Speaker 2 (01:24:05):
I mean, I guess at least the hissy Fit Award
is not just women who are nominated for it, which
is sort of what I assumed. Oh wow, okay, so
it's an inclusive all genders could have a hissy fit
at the Teen Choice Awards. I just want to see
who she was up against. Okay, So Miley Cyrus actually
one one Choice hissy fit two years in a row.

(01:24:28):
Congratulations to her for what Hannah Montana. She won for
Handah Montana the movie in nine, and then she won
for the last song question Mark in twenty ten.

Speaker 1 (01:24:38):
Oh that's one of those. I think it's a Nicholas
Sparks adaptation.

Speaker 2 (01:24:43):
That sounds right. She's tied with Madeline Petch of Riverdale
for most hissy Fit Awards won. Okay, so that's exciting.
I just wanted to shout out that baffling award. So yeah,
Miley Cyrus one Puff Daddy was also nominated for him
is hissy Fit and get him to the Greek Giovanni

(01:25:04):
Vrabisi was nominated for his hissy Fit and Avatar one.
Oh yeah, And Vince Vaughn was nominated for his hissy
Fit and Couple's Retreat.

Speaker 1 (01:25:13):
Wow.

Speaker 2 (01:25:14):
So you know, when it comes to that now defunct
a word, I'm sure it was just an honor to
be nominated.

Speaker 1 (01:25:22):
I'll go through the remaining things on my what the
Fuck list? Sure, we've touched on a few of them.
The ones we haven't touched on, the whole scene where
that teen boy is naked in front of his girlfriend's
mom and then runs out into the street while he's
still naked. Sure. Emma Roberts tells basically everyone that she

(01:25:46):
comes into contact with that she plans to have sex
today for the first time. She tells her teacher, she
tells the family she babysits for, people who don't necessarily
need to know. But also I'm glad that she feels open.

Speaker 2 (01:26:00):
Kristin Shall gets to know.

Speaker 1 (01:26:02):
Oh Shall gets to Also, speaking of Christian Shall, don't
disrespect her by putting her in the movie and only
letting her have two lines. Also, Kathy Bates, don't disrespect
Kathy Bates like that, I see.

Speaker 2 (01:26:17):
I disagree. I think the less you're in this movie,
the more you are respected.

Speaker 1 (01:26:22):
Fair. Fair.

Speaker 2 (01:26:23):
I think Charlie McClain is in this movie too much.
She's too good to be in this movie as.

Speaker 1 (01:26:28):
Much she is too good. What else let's see. Jennifer
Garner is an elementary school teacher. She's teaching her young
students about protons and electrons. They are supposed to be
fifth graders, although some of them look like they're seven.

Speaker 2 (01:26:43):
Yeah. There's also like a kid who knows about the
Saint Valentine's Day massacre in Chicago. Yeah, which I was like,
who told him about that? That's what a prey?

Speaker 1 (01:26:54):
Cool? Either way, I don't think kids start learning about
Adams when they're in fifth grade. I was learning about
like nimbus clouds in science class, so that's not tracking.

Speaker 2 (01:27:07):
I was learning about Valentine's Day and protons in the
same class.

Speaker 1 (01:27:13):
Okay, what else during the Little the little kid's name
is Edison, I think whatever. He plays a soccer game.
He's distracted because he's so freaking in love with Jennifer Garner.
And then the ref comes up to him to encourage
him to keep playing. Not the coach, but the ref.
That is not the ref's job.

Speaker 2 (01:27:32):
Oh, I didn't even notice that.

Speaker 1 (01:27:33):
I don't think the people who wrote this movie understand
how a soccer game is played. Final thing. Anne Hathaway
wants to be a poet, so she's working for a
sports agent because she says she wants to learn the business.
As if working for a sports agent is going to

(01:27:55):
help with her poetry career.

Speaker 2 (01:27:59):
She's a mess, you know. Oh another line I liked,
call me mister engaged. Sure, there's a moment. This is
like an attempted, botched, really confusing joke. It's another offensive
thing that happens at the Ashton Kutcher Flower World. There's
a woman with a baby in front of a nun
in line for flowers. She needs to hand the baby

(01:28:23):
to someone to hold flowers. Question mark. The nun says,
I will hold the baby. She says, you should know
we're Jewish, and I was like, well, so we're gonna
miss on that joke. And then and wait, good keeps
going though because the nun is like it's okay, God
loves everyone or something, and then the baby collaps for
the nun's tolerance. It's really weird. It's really bizarre. I

(01:28:47):
also liked the scene. We mentioned this before, but I
wrote to some of the lines because Taylor Swift's line
reads bless her heart. They're just not very good. But
that scene where she's in the elevator with Jennifer Carter
and Taylor Swift is like, I have to go to school.
I have a boyfriend, I live here. I hope to
get a lot of Valentine's Valentine's Day. Isn't this sweet

(01:29:07):
that my boyfriend got me this bear. I have to
go to school. You're just like she's just talking and
talking and talking, and it's like supposed to be a joke.
But it also just feels like it was written by AI.
This whole movie feels like it was maybe written by AI.

Speaker 1 (01:29:21):
The one compliment I will pay this movie is the
movie does take the time during the press conference where
Eric Dane says I'm gay and I'm gonna.

Speaker 2 (01:29:34):
Play thank you for saying it.

Speaker 1 (01:29:36):
Of course, the movie does take the time to cut
away to a sign language interpreter who is signing during
Eric Dane's speech. That's I appreciated that because that rarely happens.
That's rarely shown on screen. You never see that in movies.
So that's a good point. I was like, Wow, not

(01:29:57):
that that character ever comes back, like the sign interpreter.

Speaker 2 (01:30:01):
I mean, but I do appreciate that, Like, yeah, that
that was just like a normalized part of the world.
That's a good point.

Speaker 1 (01:30:07):
Yes.

Speaker 2 (01:30:07):
I also wanted to shout at the actor who plays Ronnie,
who is like the love interest of Edison. She is
now a very successful working actor. She was in one
of my favorite movies to watch on a plane missing
Have you seen it? I love a computer movie. I
love a movie that happens on the computer. She's storm

(01:30:28):
Read's best friend.

Speaker 1 (01:30:30):
Is that the John Chow and Deborah Messing is also
their movie.

Speaker 2 (01:30:34):
No Zion is. Deborah Messing is not in this movie.
This is the new one It came out last year,
where Gabrielle Union plays a bomb who goes missing. The
first one is called Searching. This is missing. It takes
place in the Searching universe. I don't know why you
would get confused, but she's also she's also in a
typical she was in Never Have I Ever, and she

(01:30:57):
was in Poker Face. Okay, I feel that I'm too
old to watch all of those shows, but there's no.

Speaker 1 (01:31:03):
Such thing as being too old for anything.

Speaker 2 (01:31:07):
If my sure, I guess what I'm saying is I
probably won't watch those shows. But it's nice. I feel
like it's very rare that you see like a character
actor with one scene who goes on to have it
seems like a pretty successful career. And she's like only
in her early mid twenties, So shout out to her
nose and her having Frank Zappa on her iPod or whatever.

Speaker 1 (01:31:29):
Yeap, do you have anything else you'd like to say, Jamie.

Speaker 2 (01:31:34):
I'd like to say that I'm gay and I'm going
to play. But that's all I have to say at
this time. I have an announcement. Uh just it's like
the raw conviction with which he says the line is
really awesome. And again, I really do think it's like
it is a impactful, like cool thing that that character

(01:31:58):
is included an out and the even though it's unbelievably
dated and messy, that the movie is like supportive of him. Yeah,
and then it's just like that they wrote that line
down and that's awesome. So yeah, shout out to Eric Dane,
a man whose face I just can never commit to memory. Yeah,
the movies he's in this year in twenty ten or

(01:32:19):
Valentine's Day and Burlesque, this is like a banterer year
for him, being in some of the worst movies of
our time.

Speaker 1 (01:32:27):
Just one last thing on his character. And admittedly I
did zero research on this, and I know really nothing
about the NFL. But oh, since that movie came out,
I think a number of NFL players have come out
as gay. And I honestly, again because I did no research,
don't know what the response to that was from the NFL,

(01:32:49):
from the general public. I simply don't know. But I
know that this is a thing and maybe I'll research
more about it. But because I do not care anything
about American football, I didn't bother.

Speaker 2 (01:33:03):
I don't think you need to apologize for otisfied. Yeah,
to the extent that it's like professional football is still
unbelievably homophobic, and anyone who does come out is even
if they're accepted by the league, are generally bombarded with
hate speech from a lot of professional football fans.

Speaker 1 (01:33:19):
So I'm reading here that I'm a player named Carl
Nassib was the NFL's first openly gay player to play
in a regular season game in twenty twenty one, so
eleven years after this movie came out.

Speaker 2 (01:33:35):
So I don't want to like not as mishandled as
it is, this plot point was a bit ahead of
its time, and I also wanted to because I guess
if we have Gray's Anatomy fans listening to this, I
truly haven't seen in an episode. Sorry. So apparently Eric
Dane is mixed Steamy to Patrick Dempsey's Make Dreamy, So

(01:33:58):
I'm sure that in two thousand ten people were like
mc Stevie and Make Dreamy in the same Anyways, I'm
sure it's a great show. I haven't watched it and
I won't in same but that is probably a very
critical I'm sure that that is like what he was
most famous for at this time was being he was
four years deep on mixed steam when he was in

(01:34:18):
this movie. So there you go. There you go, I
have nothing else to say.

Speaker 1 (01:34:23):
This movie, as we mentioned, does pass the Bechdel test
a few times. For example, when Jennifer Garner and Jessica
Biale talk about the I hate Valentine's Day party.

Speaker 2 (01:34:35):
Yeah, but it quickly derails.

Speaker 1 (01:34:37):
Right, It's mostly very small exchanges that are part of
larger conversations that don't pass the Bechdel test. Most exchanges
in the movie are about heterolove and attraction. It's a
lot of men and women talking to each other. It's
a lot of women talking to other women about men,
but it's also men talking to each other about women,

(01:35:00):
such as when Ashton Kutcher and George Lopez talk about
like mushy romantic love. Right, But you don't see very
much in movies, So I was like, okay.

Speaker 2 (01:35:09):
Again, would have been helpful if you got to see
George Lopez's relationship at all until all in silent montage
right late in the movie. But yeah, it is. I
guess you do have like a lot of people in
this movie that are hopeless romantics of all genders, right,
or of the two genders that this movie recognizes. Right,
And then the same is true in the reverse, where

(01:35:30):
it's like you have, although it's not quite in the
same way where I feel like you don't unless there's
so many people. Maybe I'm wrong about this, but I
don't think that there's a woman in this movie who
is like fuck love. You get Jessica Biel being like
I want love so badly that it's ruining my life
and I'm laying on the floor, which is quite different.

Speaker 1 (01:35:49):
Right, I don't really get Jessica Bile's thing where it's
like I hate Valentine's Stay so much, not for any
institutional reasons, it's more because I'm so freaking lonely and pathetic.

Speaker 2 (01:36:03):
Yeah, it makes no sense.

Speaker 1 (01:36:04):
And okay, oh I forgot to mention this. When Jennifer
Garner is describing her friend, who turns out to be
Jessica Bile, she's describing her as neurotic and a hot mess.
We're like, that's not a nice way to talk about
your friend.

Speaker 2 (01:36:21):
I know. Yeah, I was like, wow, do you guys
like each other? Also, how do you guys know each other?

Speaker 1 (01:36:26):
How does anybody know each other? In this movie?

Speaker 2 (01:36:29):
They all go to the same plate studio or something like,
we don't We're not given the reason this movie takes
place in space, like I don't even know. Yeah, I
hope that the couple that got married at the Indian
restaurant sued Jessica Bihl for making such a loud ass
party about how much they hated love directly facing their wedding.

Speaker 1 (01:36:52):
Rude, so rude.

Speaker 2 (01:36:54):
Yeah, I don't know this. It's a funny, bad movie.
Like I would watch this in a group. It feels
ripe for a drinking game.

Speaker 1 (01:37:02):
I was just gonna say I would play a drinking
game to this movie. Yeah, absolutely, But.

Speaker 2 (01:37:07):
Yeah, it does tactically pass the Bechtel test. I think
it also passes between like Anne Hathaway and Queening Latifa
at some point. But their conversation is so bizarre that
you're like, is this a meaningful exchange of dialogue? Does
a meaningful exchange of dialogue exist in this world? Hard
not say. But what about our metric, which is important.

Speaker 1 (01:37:25):
Our nipple scale where we rate the movie zero two
five nipples based on examining the movie through an intersectional
feminist lens. I'm giving it, as I already foreshadowed negative
five nipples the end.

Speaker 2 (01:37:41):
I'm going to give it half of one nipple actually
for attempting to include gay characters in twenty ten, even
though they do arguably a not good job, horrible job.
I feel like the fact that there was even an
attempt that is not openly hateful. It's just laden with stereotypes.

(01:38:03):
But that's a very very small comfort. But like I
do think that that is something that most movies in
twenty ten had no interest in even attempting. So true,
there you go, there's that and kind of yucky to
everything else. Did I have fun watching it? Was I laughing? Yes?

Speaker 1 (01:38:22):
I mean I was tee heeing quite a bit.

Speaker 2 (01:38:27):
It's fun. It's fun to live in a world where
George Lopez is always outside your door quoting roomy, Sure,
why not?

Speaker 1 (01:38:35):
Sure?

Speaker 2 (01:38:36):
Yeah. So I would have half nipple and I'm going
to give it to Megan Surrey who played Ronnie.

Speaker 1 (01:38:42):
Oh nice, nice. If I had to give anything to anyone,
it would be Kathy Bates. Oh yeah, God, but I
have no nipples to give.

Speaker 2 (01:38:52):
It felt like she that was like community service for
her or something like she like got a speeding ticket
and then she had to be in Valentine's Day. That
should be what famous actors have to do when they
like do a parking violation.

Speaker 1 (01:39:05):
Yeah, yeah, I agree. Well, listeners, thank you so much
for indulging us on this Valentine's Day.

Speaker 2 (01:39:14):
Yes, it's true.

Speaker 1 (01:39:15):
May your holiday be not as pepe poo poo as
this movie is.

Speaker 2 (01:39:22):
Yeah, I honestly I wouldn't wish the fate of any
of these characters on any of you. You're welcome. Yeah wow,
And yeah, Caitlin and I will probably what like, drink
it your last tonight. Yeah, true traditions, tradition.

Speaker 1 (01:39:37):
Baby, So thanks for listening. You can follow us on
social media at Bechdelcast. You can subscribe to our Patreon
aka Matreon, where we are doing wedding Webuary. So it's
a couple wedding related movies, just a deep in theme

(01:40:01):
with love.

Speaker 2 (01:40:04):
We love love. But do we go over there to
check it out. It's five bucks a month and you
also get access to our back catalog of over one
hundred and fifty episodes if you could believe it. It's
a super fun community over there. We have fun over there,
we sure do. So. Yeah, check us out over there.
Follow us on Instagram, Twitter. We still sometimes updates sometimes

(01:40:25):
and stay tuned because we have some tour information coming
out in the near Future.

Speaker 1 (01:40:31):
We sure do. Okay, Bye Hi. The Bechdel Cast is
a production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Derante and Jamie Loftis,
produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mola Board. Our theme
song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Catherine Vosskrosenski.

(01:40:52):
Our logo and merch is designed by Jamie Loftis and
a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about
the podcast, please visit linktree slash Bechtelcast