The Royal Tenenbaums with Jenny Yang

about the portrayal of women in movies. That's right. We measure it sort of by the Beck Dold test, or that's our jumping off point UM, which for us is a test that requires that a movie has two female identifying characters who have names, they speak to each other about something other than a man, and their conversation has to be at least two lines of dialogue. Bar pretty easy to do, but some movies really struggle. I would say most movies great transition into the movie and really

the body of work. This is a popular request for us, and I would just say movies of this particular filmmaker, people get a real freshman year attachment to this is a peak, you know, like have you ever had sex with a guy that has a French poster of Oh okay? Hard to stop in but I've I've you know, I feel like many people have had the experience of hooking up with someone who has a framed poster of this filmmaker in their house, and it is a real red flag.

I mean, less of a red flag than a lot of directors, but yeah, not the biggest red flag, but a little, a little, a little waving to say, hey, I'm gonna try to explain something to you and soon. Yeah. So the director we're talking about, of course, is West Anderson. The movie we're covering today is The Royal Tenenbombs. First, before we get into our heavy discourse, let's know, some heavy flow discourse today. Yeah, let's introduce our guest. She's a stand up comic. She is an actor, she is

a writer, and she's so wonderful. Jenny. Yeah, thank you for having me, Thanks for being here. Let's do this. Let's do it. Okay, So we're taking taking the Wes Anderson bullet. No one's been brave enough apparently. But you know, The Royal Tannon Bombs was like a movie I used to consider one of my favorites. I think that's pretty common. I I, well, when did you first see this movie?

What's your history with the movie. I mean, I feel like I saw it in the early adds like everyone else, you know, when it came out ish like, but like not in the theaters. I forget if I saw it in the theaters. I just remember it made a really strong impression on me because I feel like I was probably already raised so basic with pop culture that, you know, to me, seeing a Wes Anderson moving like royal Tannon

bombs was like it blew my mind. I was like, oh, wow, this is so stylized and so artsy, you know, and so I I think that was like one of my first tastes of something that wasn't just a typical popcorn movie. Yeah. Yeah, And it really made an impression, I think, probably because there's such a melancholy in the movie and it's really about like a dysfunctional family, which, in a weird way, even though I'm like not white, um, I related to them somewhat, you know. Was sort of like a messed

up patriarch kind of a storyline. And I just like the sort of droll like irony and sense of humor in it because it was still like pretty new and like interesting at this point where I feel like a lot of people have exhaustion with it now, but oh one Wes Anderson, we're talking peak West Andrewson fresh and this was one of his earlier ones. Yeah, before this, of the features, he did Bottle Rocket and Rushmore and I think maybe that's it as far as his like

notable features. Yeah, but those are like the only the movies that like indie film nerds kind of Guilty is Charged. But yeah, so I think I also saw this, not in the theaters, but shortly after it came out. I think it was my first exposure to Mr Wes Anderson. At the time, I was like, Yeah, I'm into this. I like the production design, the cinema tug, all the

meson sin. I was all for it. And now I go back and I revisit this or I see other Wes Anderson movies and I'm reminded that they usually story wise for me, this I think we were because we watched this movie together. I have seen this movie before, I think at some point in college. But and I think that this Jenny, I'm interested in your take on this.

But so far, with people we've talked to, there's a lot of Wes Anderson movies that you know you've seen, but you cannot remember anything that happens in the movie, and you're like, oh, that's the one about camp And then if someone's like, well, what happened. We were asking Jack O'Brien at how stuff works. He was like, oh, yeah, I loved I think he said like of Aquatic. I was like, oh, what is that one? He's like, uh, Submarine.

I was like, oh yeah, I love that, and you cannot tell me one thing that happens, but I don't know what it is. Most of his movies tend to explore kind of the same themes, but it's not like they're totally with you. I mean, Darjeeling Limited is just straight up a bad one, but like they're not boring movies. There's stuff that's happening, but maybe it's just so stylized that that's all you can retain, or it's just I don't know. I know I've seen at least three Wes

Anderson movies. Couldn't tell you what happens in one of them. It's just like, I feel like, if you've studied music, there's not a lot of dynamics in a Wes Anderson movie. It all kind of just the notes just kind of center around this middle part, right, emotional notes, energy, right, it just kind of stays right, pretty static. Yeah. Right, So, so I feel like and the look of it is all kind of in that same kind of like you know,

early Instagram filter, right and pretty wide, way too much headroom. Yeah, like we're living. Yeah, It's it's all just that, right, And so that's why I feel like, you know, visually, two people will just kind of confuse one West Sanderson movie with another. It's like we're living inside of like a thrift store diorama, you know, and so and they're

just swapping out these dioramas. But but for me, though, I feel like, maybe, you know, Bottle Rock, it might have been a little different, but I feel like it was Royal Tannon Bombs that really set the tone for like the look of his more commercially successful films after that, right, absolutely, yeah, And so I feel like I feel like, no matter what, Royal Tannon Bombs might stick out a little more for people in terms of being memorable. But yeah, after that,

it's gets kind of blurry. It's kind of yeah, the tone is sort of set with this movie, and then you're like visually and I'm sure you know, people who know a lot about film know the specifics, but like, visually frame from Royal Tannon Bombs and frame from moon Rise Kingdom the same fucking things. Like it's like and now it's not even a bad thing. It's okay to have consistency throughout a body of work. But the Wes

Anderson theory. If you are listening and you consider yourself a fan of Wes Anderson's work, I defy you try to uh summarize one of his movies and not just have it be like, that's the one about dogs, that's the one about camp, that's the one about underwater, that's the one about I don't know Bill Murray's in it. Like that, Oh, I think that serves as a great transition to the recap, which I will try my best to do. I just watch the movie twice and I

still don't. Okay. Basically, we learn about this family of Tenant Bombs. The patriarch is Royal Tenant Bomb played by Jane Hackman. He's married to Ethelene. They have three kids, Chaz, Margot and Ritchie, and they're like a bunch of baby geniuses. They're these very accomplished kids who like do a lot in their youth and they're very exceptional, and and that's

pulled um a bunch of different sources. Where the Magnificent Anderson's is an Orson Wells film that's referenced pretty heavily in this, and then it's also referencing J. D. Salinger's Glass Family. I believe you're called so Wes Anderson he's pulling from other male ahturs of note of like the White family that's really smart but tragic, Like that's he's clearly pulling from that sort of stock story, right. Yeah.

So it's this family of like exceptional young kids and the plarents split up when they're fairly young, and they kind of estranged themselves from Royal Tenenbaumb until a few things happen where he gets kicked out of his hotel room and he's broke and he doesn't really know what to do, so he decides to reconnect with his family under the ruse of telling them that he is dying so they will basically take sympathy on him and be

more willing to reconnect with him. So this happens for a while where the family who had kind of drifted apart over the years, gets back together. They're all under one roof again where Ethylene lives. Ethylene is considering getting remarried, yes to Henry played by Danny Glover right, and then all of the kids have kind of they were exceptional in their youth, but they've kind of like leveled out and they're not that great anymore, or they're just not

exceptional the way they were when they were kids. So they're sort of reconnecting, and over the course of a few days or so, um, it comes out the Royal is not actually dying of stomach cancer like he says he is. Uh, he just made that all up so that people would take pity on him and want to hang out with him again. So then he gets kind of cast away again. But the family is still sort of like working through their issues and their relationships with each other in that like two of them are in love.

But it's fine. It's fine because Margot is adopted Paltrow. So basically the story ends with the family reconnecting just as Gene Hackman's character wanted, but under unusual circumstances, and so flash forward, he dies, and then the movie ends when the company Goop is is founded. Marco has a wild idea. What is she founded the most annoying company possible? Then goop starts, Wait does that happen? No, Like I'm talking about Gwyneth two snail cream. Oh okay, I am

aware of Gwyneth and her products, Gwyneth her content. You know, I would say live in ignorance with Gwyneth and her products. It's a lot okay. Yeah, So yeah, that's basically the story, and there are some interesting things to talk about there. Yeah, I guess I guess so much, so much, yeah, or so little. There's I don't know, Like I have a lot of notes for this. It's but it's hard to know where to star. Well, so there's two main female characters of any note in, Margot played by Gwyneth Patro

and Ethylene played by Angelica Houston. Right, So the first opening sequence of the movie is our introduction of the young Tenembombs, and we learn a little bit about the children and then the parents as well. So with like Ethylene, we learned that her main concern was the children's education, and then it pretty quickly cuts away from her it goes to Chaz. We learned about him loving finance, he bread Dalmatian mice. He was a real estate mogul as

a small child. Then we learned about Margot. We learned that she is adopted. She is a playwright. Um. We see her in a dark room, we see her doing ballet. Um. She camps out in a library for a while with her brother Richie. She's not like the other girls, right, she smokes and she's I don't know, there's And then we learned about Ritchie, who was a stark tennis player. We see him playing with a ham radio. He has a drum set, He paints pictures of Margo. He has

a bird named Mordecai. And then we learned about Royal and that he was a litigator until he was disbarred in the mid eighties. So we're getting an introduction to all these characters. It feels as though the two women that we learned about, I don't know, they just feel more glossed over or like. The only accomplishment that is noted for Margo is that she won like the Braverman

Grant in ninth grade for a play she wrote. But for the boys, it's like, oh, they did this thing, and they did this thing, and they did this thing. And did, and then Ethelene is like basically just described in the context of her being a mother in that sequence. So right away, I feel like it's sort of that whole thing lays the groundwork for how the female characters

will be treated throughout the rest of the movie. It's interesting because it's it's like the story has like the skeleton of female characters that could be well developed if the movie was going to like invest time in it. Like we know that Ethleene is an archaeologist and a really good one, Like she has this career, and and there's enough there that we could explore something outside of

how she behaves as a mother and a wife. But that's all the movie really chooses to explore it, which is frustrating because she's like, well there's more, there's more there, but it just we just don't really get to see it. No, we don't, you know. When I was watching, I kind of like looked at like when the women said lines, and it really wasn't until like a third of the

way in that, like Ethelene finally talked to her daughter. Yeah, everyone, it was like a while, and even before that, each of them got maybe one or two lines, right because in terms of like the Bechdel tests, like you're like, well, that's going to be the scene that would pass if we get to see these characters together at all, Like and it's just kind of the question of like will

we get to see them together? And it takes a long time, which is kind of a bummer too because Ethelene and well, I guess if we start with Royal, Royal has medi substantial scenes with all three of his children, with some of them more than once. Evelyne kind of doesn't. We see her interact with all three of her children, but it's not with the same amount of depth. It

doesn't reveal as much about her character. It sort of exists more to tell us about her kids and not really anything about her, where the Royal scenes are either like equal of like we're learning about him and his child or we're just learning about him and like why he is a liar or why you're something about his past, Where I mean we learn a lot about Royal Tenan bombs past, we don't really learn we learned about Ethelyne's

past as it pertains to Royal. I think that's what's messed up about this is that it is about a dysfunctional family that is dysfunctional primarily in response to how messed up Royal is, right, the patriarch, and so this whole, this whole story is surround being sort of royal driving what's happening. Right, So he's like wants to get back in with the family so that he can intervene and

really have a relationship. So he's always the one trying to instigate something or call one of his kids out, whereas Ethylene only serves as like a typical female counterbalance, kind of patriarchal counterbalance to that, which is like she's the one to soothe, to coax to like yeah, exactly, she's to clean up the messer. And obviously that's probably

reflective of their relationship. And I think that it poses the same question I always have, which is, if say, we do want to talk about how messed up the patriarchy is, you know, and we write a story about it, how much is that just simply continuing to put a spotlight on the men to reflect to you know what I mean, rather than really dismantling it or in doing it.

And I think that's what's tough. You know. On the one hand, like if I have a similarly messed up kind of patriarchal dad, and I want to write about that to dissect it. Does that mean I'm giving more power to that person's voice, you know what I'm saying, Like like because we're because we're still saying Royal is the one taking the action. He's he's getting protagonists. Yeah, he gets all the fun scenes. I think, Yeah, I

think that that is part of it. Yeah, Like the movie isn't critical enough of him where he is, Like the way that like misogyny is displayed through Royals is like lighthearted and you can imagine a giggle in the movie theater cheeky. Yeah, and the same with when he's like being racist against Danny Glover's character is like, oh, just an old guy being an old guy, and it normalizes it pretty quickly in the context of the movie.

And and then at the end, what what I mean, I forgot literally everything that happened in this movie, But I definitely forgot the end where I feel like we we get close to criticizing Royal when he's kicked out of the house and they're like, no, fuck you, you

can't lie to us anymore. You're you're cast out. But then in the end, you know, he does sort of apologize, but that was even that was like, did he really And then at the end he dies and sort of the takeaway of the movie is like, well, if he hadn't a lot all those times, the family wouldn't be back together. And I was just like, oh, so we should.

So it ends up being completely uncritical of the patriarchy and the patriarch in that they're like, well, yeah, mistakes were made, but families chill now, And it wouldn't have been if he hadn't like faked cancer and gas light his whole family. Like I was just like, no, what they're like the consequences of this, Uh, the Shenanigans actually

was kind of good if he worked out. If we end this movie with like and we've cast out the patriarch who clearly has no respect for us or himself, and uh, well we're all here, so let's hang out and keep him out of our lives. That's a maybe less movie. I mean, it's one of those we talked

about this. Uh. I think on our How the Grinch Stole Christmas episode and on our Muppet Christmas Carol episode about the male redemption stories that we see so much of where it's like, like, sure, if you want to make a movie about a dysfunctional family and how everyone is messed up as a result of at least one of the parents disservicing their children in some way, great, that's an interesting story, but like, why do we have to hear it from the point of view of the

person who did the messing up? Like why can't we? I mean, you know there are movies that explore it from different points of view, but it's just like, yeah, I just I have so little patience to the point where the movie is named after the yeah, like yeah, it it ends up. There are moments where it approaches being critical, but ultimately he's a redumable character. He ends up think everything he wanted, which was the relationship with his family, which he got after years of lying, and

then kind of a half past apology. So that's all. It takes great lifetime of trauma and therapy. No, no way, like just a sorry maybe just like might be like what are you talking about? I don't know, Yeah, the male redemption story and then there's a lot of men who are redeemed in the course of this story. Royal is the main one. But I think also with Richie, there's sort of like a redemption story told there. Should

we jump into him and Margot? Now, yeah, this very bizarre romantic relationship is established between Ritchie, who is a biological tenenbomb, and Margot, who is an adopted Tenan bomb. This is the premise of the most searched porn on porn. Okay, yeah, like you see that, You're like, this is this is a Wes Anderson thing. There must be a Wes Anderson Richie and Margot. I'm gonna go search after this CP incognito. I'm gonna do it in plain sight. I don't care

who knows. I'm going to Starbucks right now, gorgeous symmetrical pornography. A Kink song is playing in the background this time tomorrows. I mean, they have face flopping technology, so who knows. Maybe it's you know, kind of a joint. Okay. So this this relationship is established where for the most part we see Richie like pining over Margot. He's painting pictures

of her, he's waiting at the bus stop for her. Yeah, but then whenever it comes out finally that they basically confess their love for each other, and at this point we don't really know that Margot had loved him. We only find out in that moment because we're seeing most of the nature of their relationship through Richie's point of view. So one, I find it weird that we don't know

how she feels about totally. That's her reaction whenever he's like I love you, and she's like, I love you too, and then they kiss, and then they lie down and a tent together, like we didn't know because she is married to Bill Murray's character Raleigh, and then also was having an affair with Eli Rock and not Eli Rock, like so yeah, so she was. She's engaged in multiple relationships with men, which means that she is the object. I feel like Margot's main purpose in the story is

to be the object of several men's affection. The same for Ethelene, where it's the push and pull between like is Royal gonna rope her back in? Or is she going to marry Henry? There's no option presented where she

can be single. Kind of the same for Marco. And there's those two montage scenes in regards to those characters that I wanted to talk about where there's a lot of montage scenes in all of wes Anderson's work, and and these aren't the only ones that appear, but the two montage scenes that are specific to Marco and to Ethylene are almost exclusively about their sexual history. Yes, well, in Margot's case, not all meant but mostly right, where Like we see highlights from Margot's life and it's like

she starts to smoke, she leaves school. The rest is for sexual right, and then for Ethylene, it's here are the men that she's dated since she and Royal tennan bomb broke up, and then we get finally to Henry, who is the new man in her life. So there's no there's really no ambiguity about like what matters to the story with these characters, where there are other elements

of their lives. But that's not what wes Anderson and co writer Owen Wilson really want your attention on, right, because we don't see any such montages like that of characters romantic or sexual histories with any of the male characters, noticed only with Ethylene and Margot, which is a very

deliberate choice and a very glaring they do give. They give Ben Stiller's character a different trope, which is the good old fashioned dead wife his wife, and they do go to see her gravestone, much like in The Rock his favorite movies. Yeah, Ben Stillers and the and his wife who we never meet, but her death is the main thing that defines his character is dealing with and how that has manifested in him being extremely overprotective of his two sons and being like very overly concerned with

their safety. That's a part of the movie I didn't dislike. I thought it was like kind of nice and a little unusual to see a single father definitely being overbearing, but being a pretty solid parent throughout the movie, Like definitely overprotective, but usually like if you see a single father.

You don't see a lot of single fathers in movies at all, um, but especially like if you do see a single father, he's fucking up and he you know, he doesn't get it, can't relate with his kids or whatever. And I mean to like the Chad's tennem bomb character is a good dad who clearly is suffering from PTSD. But but I agree, Yeah, but also Ben still is

just really good at playing nervous. He's great and yeah, and then the best visual pun in the whole movie is a the end when Royal tenan bomb does Ben still learn his son's show up in black track suits to the funeral because they have been in red Adida's track suits up until that point. They switched it up out of respect. These characters do not stray far from their costume design solid aesthetic um. Back to the relationship between Margot and Richie, I mean, why was the choice made.

I mean, it's not technically an incestual relationship because they're not related by blood, but it's weird. I mean, I feel like it it introduces, like, in theory, if we paid a little more attention to the Marco character outside of how she relates to the men, you know, or how she furthers the male stories, we don't need that

romance at all. Really, Like, if if you took the time spent on Margot and Richie's not incestual relationship and put that into flashing out the background of Margot and of Ethylene a little more, you almost like don't really

need it. I don't hate that it's there, but I do think that it just, yeah, it kind of takes away from Margot's character quite a bit because it's like even the first time you see Margot as an adult, it's such a male, like a kind of a comically male gazy shot where she gets off the bus and it's like slow motion and he loves her, and you're like, wait, but he's her brother, and you know, I don't know. I guess I don't know where I fall in that

well for me. So after the family discovers that Royal had been lying about having cancer, that's like halfway through the movie, which means there's a whole half of the movie to go. And where the plot goes from there is basically focusing on Richie and Margot's relationship, with a few of the subplots like weaved into that, but that's largely what the narrative focuses on. Three big things that evanced the narrative in this movie are Royal lies to

his family. That's the first phase. Second phase, which I think is done pretty irresponsibly by this movie, is Ritchie tries to kill himself. That's what brings the family together the second time after they disperse. And the third thing that brings everybody together is Ethylene decides to marry Henry, and there's a wedding. Those are the three things that bring the family together. All of them are pretty intrinsically connected to either men or marriage. That's all there is

the boys. The boys are back in town, or we're marrying the boys, right, Because the way that the male characters, including the narrator, talk about Margot or the way that she serves a purpose in the narrative, well like, for example, Richie attempts suicide because he has just learned that she had been having an affair with his best friend Eli, which I mean, we can get into a whole discussion about how this movie does not handle suicidality and mental

illness well at all, but setting that aside, So him discovering that she was having an affair with his friend prompts Ritchie to attempt suicide. Then her husband, Raleigh played by Bill Murray, goes on this whole tirade where he blames Margo for Richie's suicide. This is shortly after he has called himself a cook and then he gets up. Earlier in the movie, Royal confronts Margot because she doesn't he doesn't like the way that she's treating her husband rally,

because she's so secretive. The different montages that the narrator is describing, it's often in the context of who she's married to or who she used to be married and divorced too, and then we focus on things about her husband when we should be learning more about her. So even when she's on screen or even when she's being talked about, it's still usually in the context of her relationship to the men in her life, which is stupid.

That's my hot, very academic take on that. Marco kind of like with athletes character, there's like a glimmer of like, why why don't we look at that a little more instead of making her marry someone or making her fall in love with something like you get that flashback scene where Margot looks for her birth family and finds them and then is unsatisfied, and you know, like kind of a trophy approach to the adopted child story where they go to find their origin and then it doesn't answer

the question that they actually had and like doesn't end

up solving all their problems. Fine, a pretty interesting scene and shows us more of that character and kind of like where she's coming from, but then it's kind of really not touched one again and and I mean, I can't say this with certainty, but it seems like part of the reason that I mean, she's made to be adopted so that it's weird as an audience, are okay with her kissing Luke Wilson, but it goes largely kind of unexplored where you see like a little piece of

it and you're like, oh, that's interesting. But then the main takeaway of that is like she's still sad and it's actually fine if she makes out with Luke Wilson, and that's all really all we're given. I feel like the way that the semi incestuous relationship is covered is such an indication of how Wes Anderson portrays the depth

of true relationship dynamics. It's almost like, fundamentally, this family is a codependent, dysfunctional family with a very mean and narcissistic father figure, right, and that has all of these consequences with like all the kids being depressed and probably self critical and in some way self harming. And that's really deep and like sad and awful, and that's like

what happens in like a family dynamic like that. But like what Wes Anderson does is he like takes a story like that, but only skims really the like the cute and the quirky and the delightful parts for us to look at, you know, which is entertaining, But there is something to be desired when it comes to really getting into why the relationships are the way they are totally right, Like, it's like, oh, we have this sort

of surface level presentation of this really dysfunctional family. The jokes are cute, the casual racism chuckle chuckle, you know, and so and so I think in the end, I've heard about dynamics where step children might grow way way too close, or even regular children grow way too close because the parents are like not really there for kids, you know. But and maybe that could be an explanation for Margo and Richie, but we don't really get that,

you know. Yeah, it's not like and the fact that Wes Anderson, you know, really goes out of his way to be like they are not related is a very deliberate choice in his part. And I think that the choices like I want this movie to make a lot of money and be successful, and I don't want people to feel weird about it. I wanted to be quirky and like not like the other relationships, but I don't want it to be outside of what is conventionally acceptable, and you know with in the law and all that stuff.

So yeah, and then and then I really like and we don't really have time to fully unpack it, but just the way that this movie treats Richie's suicide attempt is very sudden and more graphic than I remembered, and beautifully shot though guards of symmetry, gorgeous shot of this horrifying act that is really barely commented on after it happens, and it's just I mean, it's scared to see, like he literally slits his wrists on camera, which I mean,

we can argue the ethics of that. I just don't think that that's like a responsible thing to do in what you're trying to have be a mainstream movie. And then really it just serves the narrative purpose of you know, getting Margot to talk to Ritchie again and to get the family together again. And outside of that that like very drastic upsetting action is not really addressed that much after that, except of like, well Margot is talking to me again, so shrug, Like it's just it's very bizarre.

I mean, the gorgeousness of the art direction and the cinematography risks rising suicide and depression, you know what I mean. It's like that was pretty well yeah, yeah, like why

did that look so nice? Right? And then the scene after so you see he kind of like lays his arms onto the sink and then you see the blood kind of rushed down and then that cuts immediately to it's not comical, but it's such a juxtaposition against what we just saw that it's almost like, I don't know exactly how to describe it, but it's like a bunch of doctors and nurses and stuff like that rushing him the hall and it's like suddenly this bright colors and

it's like the music, the music and the and just the movement on the screen almost makes that seem amusing. Yeah, well, I think that the especially with the music there is communicating is like and we're all back together again because

this thing happened. Either that or saying like oh it's all gonna be okay, like he won't die from this, but it's still yeah, just if that felt handled irresponsible, Yeah, I mean the way that that that that shift communicated what it communicated to me was Wes Anderson saying, Oh, isn't it cute that Richie tried to commit suicide, but he's not going to be successful ha ha because he

got found before. He can't get that right exactly, but that's how that felt because because the way he was found was pretty soon after he you know, started bleeding and he was on the floor of the bathroom and like the random test subject of Rally st Clair finding the teenage, Yeah, a lot of hair, a lot of

hat I'd like to throw in here. Um. You know, if I were to rewrite the Royal Tannon bombs from a different perspective in order to fulfill the Bechdel test, I would write it from the perspective of Sing Sing Oh okay, yeah, Sing Sing with this the character in

the very beginning, that's the masseuse. Uh. You know, in the scene where you find out that Royal is going to get kicked out of the hotel that he's been seeing in and you pan up and you see Sing Sing is uh, you know, his his masseuse looks kind of asian e and Sing Sing is like what an elementary school bully would call me in order to make fun of my Chinese name. Yeah, so I'm just like okay, and so I would I would rewrite the royal tannem

bombs from Sing Sing's perspective. You actually see Sing Sing later on um do you do? She's in the background. And I think this is very indicative of the people of color characters that in this movie. For Wes Anderson, you have Pagoda, which is it's a Japanese word for

a Chinese architectural detail. That is the name that is given to the Indian man in Calcutta, that he is his sort of man servant for the royal for royal, So very bizarre, and and and and so you know, because of the sort of wide angle shots that we get of every scene, the sort of quirkiness and the benefit of the color and the texture of of these shots is that you get to see side characters and background actors and background movement right while the foreground is happening.

And so so often it's either Pagoda or Sing Sing or other sort of people of color or servant type characters in the background being quirky and moving uh to to sort of be like animated gifts of delightfulness in the back and so and so I think Sing Sing would be Apparently Sing Sing showing up later probably indicates they had a really close relationship. I don't know what the nature of it. She didn't say one word, but I would rewrite that would be my wicked musical. I

would rewrite Royal tannem Bombs the musical from Sing Sing's perspective. Uh, hell yeah, I'll buy it. I would watch We'll see and then she has like a secret relationship with Pagoda, you know, I mean, yeah, it's a non white characters are largely used for comic relief in this movie, with with the exception of Danny Glover's character, who's really the only non white main character in the movie, and even

then he's like a bi character pretty much. Yeah, I think it just it just hints to the sort of orientalist problem that Wes Anderson tends to have, as we saw with Isle of Dogs recently. Because you know, you know, I noticed the Asian ship all the time in any movie, and so in what in this movie, the first time

we see Asian ship is Sing Sing the Masseuse. The second time we see Asian ship is actually um when Royal confronts Ethylene to get back into her life, and you see they actually have in a street argument and it's in front of some kind of embassy that has Chinese words, you know, and so but it's very prominent because it's you know, it's it's ethylene and royal on the right hand side of the screen and three quarters of the rest of the screen is the sort of

wall of this and you see the sign, and it's the sort of little details that tell me like it's very deliberate, because there is no scene that is not deliberate for Wes Anderson. And you know in the way that he also uses sort of essentially orientalist things as

set dressing and people as set dressing. So um to me, the setting in front of a Chinese language sign of an embassy in the street of New York is no different from the fact that Sing Sing was in the background for another scene and pago to access set dressing for other scenes. I mean, Wes Anderson is an example of one of these odd toward directors that has his little like Darling's where he keeps recasting a handful of

actors in his movies over and over again. You're Wilson Brothers, You're Jason Schwartzman's your Bill, Murray's maybe a couple of others, a ton of white actors exactly, mostly men um Wes Anderson on race is just a deep sigh. How do you spell that on a script? It's just like a bunch of us and yeah, but like repeated into infinity of like also a common not really a through line but basically just an image that you keep seeing. Is this cab that shows up all the time, Gypsy cab

gypsy again being a slur for roma people. Not okay, I feel like this is this is another male utor issue and probably a white director issue as well, of like by thinking that the mere presence of something like makes it okay. I'm trying to articulate this correctly, but I think I know what you mean. Where he's like cute defying all this stuff that he cannot possibly understand or and and cannot represent on screen responsibly. But he's like,

well it's there, so that's good. You know. I didn't ignore that because it's in my movie, So I'm doing a good job. I acknowledged that people who aren't me exist at all. So Trophy please like that cuteify ying is a good word. For the Wes Anderson filmmaking filter. Yeah, that's the name of his insta filter, slip Slipe cut. So I couldn't help but notice that towards the end, Eli crashes the wedding by literally crashing a car into

the wedding. And I just wonder if that's the inspiration for the movie Wedding Crashers that he would later star in. You know, I'm just here to ask the important question. It's Wedding Crasher is a part of the expanded Wes Anderson universe. Does anyone have any final thoughts about the movie?

You know, there's still a part of me that appreciates the craft and the storytelling that happened in the movie, Like, you know, I liked it back then, prewoke viewing days for a reason, you know, And I think I think there's a lot I can learn about storytelling. But but I think we're in this moment where flipping the script talking about the Begdel Test, seeing it means to hear from the voices of people you don't usually here in

a more popular conversation. That means that we're all going to figure out what it might mean to like create more mainstream accessible stories right, that are more critical the patriarchy, that are gonna, you know, have us drive the story. You know, your future Broadway musical, yes string, you know the sing Sing Tannerballs featuring Pagoda. That's that's my takeaway

that I want to write my wicked yeah. Yeah. And that's not to say that every single movie that comes out has to be this like hard hitting, deep analysis

of the patriarchy and how to dismantle it. Because as much as I love to watch movies like that, I also love to watch just sort of mindless popcorn movies sometimes and there ye like Wes Anderson is the king of these kind of fun, quirky movies that start to maybe explore some themes that tend to go unexplored in his movies, but he really only kind of touches on the surface of them and doesn't really do much in

the way of anything like that. But if you are going to have just a fun kind of mindless movie, I think that you do still have the responsibility to treat your characters well. And if you are going to have women in your movie, which you should, which which I mean rolling my eyes, but sometimes it has to have women because what if the proton, what if the male protagonist wants to have heterosat who is he going

to have sex with? But right, So, if you're going to make a fun, quirky, offbeat movie, then have your female characters still not be entirely defined by their relationships to men, for example, Or have the people of color in your movie not only be the help of the white characters. So yeah, just a lot of just a lot of missteps in this movie, as you can expect

from a mainstream movie. I had one other little note that it was just like but both a missed opportunity writing wise and just like come on, uh, the only writer character in this movie is Margot Tannenbaum, and yet the movie Framing Device is a book written by a man. Why we have a writer character, we have a writical Well, Eli is also a true he is a novelist, and Margot's husband, Raleigh is he is a psychologist neurologist. I think, um,

but he has also written books. I want a female narrator, yeah, but also this story would make no sense coming from a female narrator because it makes nice it's female characters a lot of the time. Also, I'm sure the narrator Ali Baldwin has some me two stories. That's oh yeah, I mean we've it's you know, the time, the when it culture has come where we finally need to hear

Alc Balbin out here what he's got to say. I think that just speaking to because Wes Anderson is such a common request from our audience, and a lot of tour directors are that because Wes Anderson's work does tend to be in its positiveness and its negative so consistent that we can take a movie like this in sort of view it to an extent as a reflection of

the filmmaker's values and interests. So you know, it is a little bit of a reflection on Wes Anderson where he is, you know, the creative driving force behind this. Where it's like this is probably a reflection at this time, at this point in time, how Wes Anderson views women and views non white people as you know, not the primary focus and thought of more in a utility way than in like, here's the character we really want to

explore and give time to. It's all about Okay, they're allowed to be there, but only to further the story of the person he's really interested in which is almost always one of his friends. Yeah. Yeah, and also reflective of the way he uses depression and mental health issues for utility. Absolutely. You know, we can judge him according to this movie, but it also is a judgment on his Yes, each of you used a French word to talk about film, and I felt left out, so I

wanted to use a French word. I loved it. I don't know. It's very well good, it's beautiful, it's very symmetrical. Gang, We're real smart. Wow. Think about us is where Genius says, does this movie pass the Bechdel test? Yeah? I would say it does there by the skin of its teeth. At there's a few conversations between Ethylene and Margot. There's a scene early on where um Margot is in the bathtub and he's like, Raleigh says, you have been spending a lot of time in the bathtub. Margo is like,

I doubt that. Shout out to the movie doubt, doubt, And then they're talking about She's like, I don't think that's very healthy. What if what if the TV falls into the tub And she's like, I tie it to the radiator and she's like, wow, it can't be very good for your eyes. And then she says Chaz came home.

So there is a two line exchange that does technically pass within that, but the conversation starts talking about Raleigh and with talking about Chaz and then Ari and Uzy, and the chunk that passes is the only part of that conversation that really has no narrative implications. It's just like that. It's it's a little joke. That's I think that almost every part of this movie that does barely pass the back to test has nothing to do with

what is actually happening in this story. Yeah. Um. The scene after that where those two women interact again is when they're talking about Eli Cash sending Ethelene his like clippings and his grades from college. That doesn't pass because they're talking about Eli. And then there's a scene at the end between the two of them again where Margot is chewing on her nicotine and hailer and she's like, what are you tring? And she's like, oh, it's supposed

to help me quit smoking. Is it working? Not really? And then a car crashes into the building and it was Eli wedding crashing with Vince Vaughn as he's always doing aleating moment, so that scene I think also technically passes because that's a four line exchange. Also, I didn't realize until you said it that way that one of the only Bectel test passing sceneson has literally ended because

a man drives a car into that scene. So poetic, Yeah, beautiful, just a real representation of And but you're right, like all the scenes that do are, all the moments that do pass the Bechtel tests have no bearing on the narrative. They could easily be cut in. The story would not be changed one bit to like, well, maybe that's because we're always trying to figure out ways to modify the test to make it a little more effective for our purposes. And that, I mean that might be a new thing

of like, what is the narrative implication? If if there's only exchanges between women and movies that have no bearing on what happens, then maybe if that shouldn't pass, right. I think in a recent episode we were saying something to the effect that we're hoping that the conversation is meaningful. So because oftentimes it's like, hey, server at a restaurant, do you have any pie? And they're like, yes, my name is Marie, and you're just like, well, I guess,

and that's not a meaningful conversation. So yeah, I mean, this movie could have easily done better. It did not capitalize on any of the opportunities to pass the Bechdel test. More, I still don't hate it. I mean, I hate myself for that, but also I still know it's okay. I mean, I don't hate I don't I don't hate this movie. I don't think it's especially regret astive. It's not progressive, but it doesn't necessarily set us back any further than we already are. So like, yeah, I mean, which says

what I guess. That just means like all right, and it's allowed to continue existence. Which, by the way, if you do want to change the test that this podcast is based on, maybe you don't have to change the name of the podcast, just called the Bechtel Plus and then you can start modifying the test. Let what we do also talk about other tests that come up, the Rito Russo test, the EVA Done tests, um, which I don't think this movie would pass. No, no, no, anyway.

So yeah, yes to passing the Bechtel tests, but that does not make it a feminist text. Unfortunately, um, let's write the movie on our nipple scale. We have a scale of zero to five nipples, and we write based on its portrayal of women. I'm going to have to give it like a one and a half, I think, because I mean a little time is spent characterizing Margot, and that she's established as a secretive person. She's a playwright,

she likes the arts, she likes photography. I mean, we only see a glimpse of that in a montage that lasts for one second. But we do learn certain things about her character that a lot of movies wouldn't even take the time to establish. But for the most part, her character exists in the narrative to be either the object of men's affections or to basically further characterize the men around her. So she is not actually characterized that

well at all, I would argue. But then there's also Ethylene, who, similar to Margot, it is pretty much only defined and characterized by her relationships to the men in her life. So I would say overall, the female characters are disserviced by the filmmakers and the narrative. So it gets one and a half nipples. One to Margot and the half nipple will go to sing sing one nipple more singing

hashtag more sings. I'm gonna go on nipple two. And this is uh something we didn't really touch on, but just going on a A lot of people who are fans of Wes Anderson, I think are teenagers, and I think that's for a reason, whichause that he is very visually appealing style that is, perhaps if you have lived

a little bit, only appealing to an extent. But the reason I bring that up is because I think Margot Tennenbaumb is kind of a very commonly cited female like role model into in the Wes Anderson's BuzzFeed quizzes about her, we took it disticals all kind Yeah, regretfully, I was a Margot, you were a chass. I was a chass. Ten I'm gonna look at you completely differently. It's because I'm pretty neurotic and extremely concerned about children's safety. You're

an amazing father. Yeah so much. You're welcome. I uh suck, no, no, no, I mean, but Margot Tennenbaum is the central female character, and I think she's very often referenced and cited as like an early you know, female avatar for for young female viewers, and the fact that we are really only given a glimpse of what we could be given and she's still largely defined by her relationship to men is disappointing and I missed opportunity to give young women character

of a little more substance. So one nipple and uh, I'll give mine a sing sing to Jenny, thank you so much for being here. We've had a great time with you. Is the best deep dives into pop culture. Where can people find you online? At Jenny Yang dot tv and every user name Jenny yngg tv. Yeah, follow Jenny. Check out our stand up She's great. You can follow us the Bechel Cast on Twitter and Instagram and Facebook,

all the social media is. Subscribe to our Matreon. It's five dollars a month and you get to bonus episodes and otherwise. Um, we just encourage you to, just like I don't know, be critical of the art you're consuming, you're guying, especially when you really like it. Yeah, bye, love you, Bye bye.