Valentine's Day (2010)

Burn attention Beck to cast listeners.

We're going on tour.

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.

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.

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 on May twenty sixth and doing Shtrek.

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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.

Happy Valentine, Jamie.

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.

Well, sounds like a nice time.

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 Day episode.

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.

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.

Good stuff, not this, but not in the past. Well, he's dead decade and a half.

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.

Wait, obviously Anne Hathaway, but who.

Joe Hector Ellis, Oh yeah, Joe, just Joe. And this one is harder but Paolo Putneska is also in this movie.

Oh, he's at the Southwest gate at the airport being like this counter is for oversized luggage only.

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.

You know.

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 film credit brutal.

I guess we've got something we have to cover in anyways.

Anyway, So to be clear, we are fans of these movies because they are some of the most fun episodes.

Because we've already covered New Year's Eve, Yes, but Gary Marshall ensemble cast movie from twenty eleven.

Yeah, and then we've also covered Princess Diaries. That might have been the only other Gary Marshall movie we've covered.

Because we have not done Pretty Woman yet.

No. Oh, he also has Pretty Woman loyalty in.

This Julia Roberts is in the movie.

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.

Yeah. Oh.

Also, Gary Marshall directed Overboard, which we haven't covered.

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?

No, that is a Penny Marshall movie. Oh, oh, silly me?

How dare I wow erasing women's work classic Caitlin Durante?

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,

Life is so hard and we need an escape.

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.

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?

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 that has been used in a lot of things, including this show. Sometimes at the end of every episode we

It does.

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.

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.

Okay.

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.

That's the main thing I remember from this was that unbelievably effective marketing.

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 would have ever watched this movie.

But I did.

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?

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 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

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?

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 and I just did not go to see this movie fair.

Maybe Ashton Kutcher would have brought you in if you were a younger.

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.

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.

Myself, maybe you would shot up for them.

I would have maybe shown up for them.

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.

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.

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.

We have one million Morley Clarkson's who just unsubscribed, Like, how dare you.

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.

Wait, we just covered a movie that he was in. He's in Burlesque that we covered on the Matreon.

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.

Oh, he's I think Jacob Ellerty's dad.

We love that for him.

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.

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, assuming she was doing him a favor, assuming they've worked together before. Emma Roberts, Julia Roberts and Taylor Swift. Wow,

Well, I don't know love actually, whether you like it or not, at least it's like mostly coherent. This movie is not.

Yeah, I mean, I just love how incoherent this movie is. I'm gonna give it five nipples no matter what.

And I'm gonna give it negative five just to counteract.

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

Oh, I didn't even there's no variety.

There's no variety in what is happening in these seas.

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.

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 with like this lingering shot on the bear, and it

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 lives inside and he like makes her do evil things. And so it's kind of like that.

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 called Juristas, where they both discussed the recent resurgence of

Do or it's someone who's doing great.

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, 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

I haven't.

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?

He did it at the AMC.

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.

Oh that's right.

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, backflip at the AMC. Burbank awesome.

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.

Yes, I mean I also still mainly blame the production for that because he was like a teenager when he started doing this.

Yeah, many mistakes were made, but let's take a quick break and then come back for the recap.

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 just wonder. I don't know.

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 Los Angeles. Ever heard of it?

Oh? Yeah?

And guess what day it is?

Oh, they won't stop reminding you.

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.

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.

And makeup perfect just everything. She's stunning.

I mean, God, bless, I would like to live in this world.

Yeah, so Ashton Kutcher is so excited.

To be engaged. Also, he's a florist.

Yes, he goes to work. He's a florist. His colleague is George Lopez, and they're doing lower stuff.

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 don't necessarily think this wife exists, and if she does, I don't know that she's alive.

Imaginary friend, more like imaginary wife. Where's that movie?

Probably on tub?

That movie is called The Joker Got Their Ass?

Oh it?

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.

Kathy Bates was available for forty five minutes to shoot this she is in two seeds that are in the exact same location.

Awesome, yeah, so cool. So Jamie Fox goes to the flower market and ends up interviewing Ashton Kutcher.

Sure, yes, not before something racist happens. But we'll get back to those.

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.

Yeah, they were not pushing him up.

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.

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.

Well, that's to set up an amazing metaphor. Jamie, tell me if you can understand this visual metaphor.

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 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.

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.

The weird thing she's doing is taking polaroid pictures of him in bed like a serial killer. Yeah.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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. 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

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 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

She's I think it's implied that she is in some kind of like special forces.

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.

It's so bizarre.

I love it.

Anyway, we learn that she's on a fourteen hour flight from wherever she's coming from.

I think that they keep it intentionally vague, super vague to not imply her in any specific war crimes, right.

Right, Yeah, And so she's on this fourteen hour flight to spend only one day with her loved one, whoever that might be.

Bradley Cooper assumes they're fucking. Yes, Bradley Cooper bakes all sorts of assumptions.

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 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.

He's a dog. Yes.

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?

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.

He's gay and he's gonna play.

Yeah, I just love that line.

Wow. So Queen Latifa and Eric Dane get together for a meeting, along with his publicist Jessica Beale. So Jessica has entered the.

Chat and she is a mess.

She's so neurotic.

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.

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.

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 every single scene.

Oh true.

Yeah, where it's like the kind of shoes where you can see the knuckles of your toes. Oh nasty.

Anyways, I was also wearing those in twenty ten.

We all were, We were all flat footed barbies back then.

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.

Yes, harkrks bear. Yes.

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 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.

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, like good morning would be awesome.

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.

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 this stuff out, like some of the scenes move. So

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 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

And even his dog doesn't love him. It's kind of awesome.

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.

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 is so long. We do get Paola Putnzka at least true.

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.

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.

As so you're like, not a real place.

Well, I guess they are in LA. I would love to reach Los Angeles Hospital.

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.

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.

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.

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.

But then everyone shows.

Up, including twenty people we've never met before, like majority characters we do not know.

Yes, anyway, She's like, I hate Valentine's Day, and Jamie Fox is also like, I hate Valentine's Day.

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.

Oh anyway, he leaves and then Eric Dane, the football player, comes out as gay at a press conference.

But what does he say.

He's like, I'm gay and I'm gonna play.

What a win?

Well because everyone's like congratulations, good for you, But are you retiring? Like that's what this press conference or supposed to be.

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

I think we obviously can.

I think that it's certainly a big part. I don't know, any inclusion in this movie is like very bare bones twenty.

Ten's I mean, that's what most of my notes are about because it's abysmal.

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.

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 gym class or track practice, We're not really sure, being interviewed by a reporter.

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 sort of like slouching over. And I celebrate that background doctor.

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.

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 security guard. You're just like, give her her sagcard.

She's like, put your shoes on. Ashton Kutcher, it's gross here.

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.

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.

And also in this movie, she's Shirley McClain.

It appears to be that she is, Yeah, she's just playing herself.

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.

Do you know what movie that was?

No?

I don't.

I didn't either. So he's upset and he's, you know, discovered that his wife, Charlie McLain, was unfaithful.

He's straight and he's not gonna play.

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 from I don't know, the fifties or sixties.

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 together with Joe from the Princess Diaries.

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.

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

Yeah, everyone's like down in front, and she's like, shut the fuck up, I'm trying to kiss my husband.

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.

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.

He sure did.

Meanwhile, Jennifer Garner gets confirmation that her boyfriend Patrick Dempsey is married.

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.

But we see her go into the doorway to get onto the plane.

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 think about doctors.

Right.

Anyways, I don't know what city she's in, but her boyfriend does have a wife.

Yeah, and she finds out where he's having dinner with his wife.

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.

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?

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.

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.

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.

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 up being Drea Roberts.

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

And meanwhile, his grandparents are too busy kissing it at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery to notice that he's missing.

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.

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, 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.

Don't do it. Don't do it.

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.

Amazing journey that they've been on.

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.

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.

She's Julia Roberts and she's in the military.

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.

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.

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.

For sure that yeah, one hundred percent, that's what happened. So how did he know.

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.

I'm gonna get a flight to la just in case that does happen.

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, two gay characters. They can't kiss, they can just be near each other.

They can lightly embrace. But that's it.

Yeah, representation When I can't get that line out of my mind. It's so funny.

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 storyline of them all. But they're kissing now.

Yeah, they're kissing in front of a green screen.

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.

Oh and then one more shot of the horcrucks bear.

We mustn't forget.

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 it's finally over.

It's finally over after two hours. Let's take another and we'll come back to discuss, and we're back.

Today was a fairy tale. There's also like original Taylor Swift song to go with. It's true this movie was so successful.

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.

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.

But when it's a drama like Crash, then it wins an oscar for some reason, even though that movie is peepee poop.

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, which is a bad movie. But I just just like, I don't want to why, I don't know.

Well, anyway, let's talk about Valentine's Day.

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?

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, able bodied people who are traditionally attractive by Western beauty standards.

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.

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.

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 even an attempted storyline, amongst other things that are off

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.

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.

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.

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.

Yeah, exactly, but not the case here.

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.

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 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

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, 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

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.

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.

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.

Why doesn't she just correct him?

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.

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?

We know nothing about him.

I guess that that is the job I projected onto him. But I do think I'm right for some reason.

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.

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. Half the characters have full names. Half the characters don't.

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.

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.

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.

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 something ridiculous. But the character who works at the flower shop is subjected to the same lazy joke about like

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.

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 told that, and there's just a lot of heavy, heavy stereotyping. I don't even want to like.

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 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.

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

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 finding love. That is something that's largely ignored and rarely shown on.

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, like grandparent characters are just there for comic relief or just like for sure, especially in these kinds of comedies.

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. But instead there's forty eight million characters in this movie, and so they're all completely glossed over and given very

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?

Oooh, that's very true.

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.

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.

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.

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

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.

Yeah, you have an easy out.

He's not a tolerant person. Get out of no's.

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.

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.

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.

And then on top of that, I was also frustrated by the implication that I mean this felt less actively.

It just felt like a very like no, I got that too.

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 all on a piece of construction of paper like a

All of these people have to go.

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.

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.

Yeah, but she gotta be smooth about it.

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.

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. I believe she's the only black woman in the movie. Yeah, and they give her nothing. Uh wull they do give

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 just icky. And I felt so embarrassed that Queen Latifa had to do that, and.

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 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.

I feel like some of these storylines aren't even worth Like, I kind.

Of feel like I have nothing to say about that, right.

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

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.

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 included anything that wasn't you know, a cis hetero monogamous

Yeah, where with the furries?

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.

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

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 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

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.

Well feminist icon Ashton Kutcher.

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 you're like, not your meeting at work.

My meeting at my work job.

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.

Clarkson, more clark from me.

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, And also it's more common for a man to demand forgiveness and be immediately granted by the other character.

Very true.

So girls could do anything including gaslight they're spousal to forgiving them for something pretty awful.

Yep, exactly.

Yeah.

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.

Yeah.

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 Teen Choice Awards and the MTV Movie Awards and all of this there's always like a real datedness to not

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 Kristen Stewart and Robert Patton. Whoa I know, double Taylor Lautner snub brutal. I'm just looking at who's one.

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. 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.

Oh that's one of those. I think it's a Nicholas Sparks adaptation.

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 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.

Wow.

So you know, when it comes to that now defunct a word, I'm sure it was just an honor to be nominated.

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 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

Kristin Shall gets to know.

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.

I disagree. I think the less you're in this movie, the more you are respected.

Fair. Fair.

I think Charlie McClain is in this movie too much. She's too good to be in this movie as.

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.

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?

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.

I was learning about Valentine's Day and protons in the same class.

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.

Oh, I didn't even notice that.

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 help with her poetry career.

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 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

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.

Play thank you for saying it.

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 that that character ever comes back, like the sign interpreter.

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.

Yes.

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 Read's best friend.

Is that the John Chow and Deborah Messing is also their movie.

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

Such thing as being too old for anything.

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.

Yeap, do you have anything else you'd like to say, Jamie.

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 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

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, from the general public. I simply don't know. But I know that this is a thing and maybe I'll research

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.

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.

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 I'm sure that in two thousand ten people were like mc Stevie and Make Dreamy in the same Anyways, I'm

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.

Yeah, but it quickly derails.

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, 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.

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 it's like you have, although it's not quite in the same way where I feel like you don't unless there's

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.

Yeah, it makes no sense.

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.

I know. Yeah, I was like, wow, do you guys like each other? Also, how do you guys know each other?

How does anybody know each other? In this movie?

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.

Rude, so rude.

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.

I was just gonna say I would play a drinking game to this movie. Yeah, absolutely, But.

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.

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.

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. 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

I mean I was tee heeing quite a bit.

It's fun. It's fun to live in a world where George Lopez is always outside your door quoting roomy, Sure, why not?

Sure?

Yeah. So I would have half nipple and I'm going to give it to Megan Surrey who played Ronnie.

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.

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.

Yeah, yeah, I agree. Well, listeners, thank you so much for indulging us on this Valentine's Day.

Yes, it's true.

May your holiday be not as pepe poo poo as this movie is.

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.

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 with love.

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 and stay tuned because we have some tour information coming out in the near Future.

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. 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