Muriel's Wedding

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
On the Bechdecast, The questions asked if movies have women
and them, are all their discussions just boyfriends and husbands
or do they have individualism? The patriarchy Zeph and Beast
start changing with the Bechdel Cast.

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Oh hello, Jamie, Hello, Hello, what's up? How are you?

Speaker 3 (00:21):
Oh?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
I'm doing pretty good.

Speaker 3 (00:23):
How are you? I'm doing all right. Yes, it's just
nice to sit down and watch an Australian film. So true,
Australian films are so slipped on, wouldn't you agree? I agree,
absolutely slipt on that Tony collects a stuff.

Speaker 2 (00:40):
She really is and I always forget she's Australian because
most of the roles I've seen her do she's doing
an American accent. Yes, I feel like she is.

Speaker 3 (00:50):
She then, and we've talked about this on the show before,
but I never I never tire of this line of discussion.
But like she and Margot Robie, I feel like our
our our strongest stealth Australians that I'm aware of, unless
there's more and we we just don't know.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
Solely true, because there's Nicole Kidman's always kind of slipping
into her.

Speaker 3 (01:14):
I would not, I would not she is. I would
not say that. I'm like, really, Nicole Kidman's Australian, nothing
but respect, but like she's constantly falling out of it. Yeah,
in a way that I simply love. I find it
very charming. Oh oh my gosh, no, wait, you're not

(01:34):
a Succession head Sarah Snook. Sarah Snook, who plays the
daughter Shive on Succession, is Australian and in all four
seasons I have I'm sure Australian folks would catch smaller slips,
but I like caught one slip and it was so
funny because she just couldn't say range. I think we've
talked about this of the Yeah, Raine drove she could.

(01:57):
She couldn't say Range, Rover, She's a Range and you're like, yeah,
New York girl boss. Anyways. Yeah, this movie is proof
positive that Tony Kullett is indeed Australian and has been
for some time, at least thirty one years. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (02:15):
I would say most of her life.

Speaker 3 (02:16):
Can't speak to before then, but this was like her big,
her big Welcome to the Bechdel Cast. My name is
Shamie Loftis.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
My name is Caitlyn Dante. This is our show where
we examine movies through an intersexual feminous ones, using the
Bechdel test as a jumping off point. We don't really
have time for that. We got to talk about Muriel's wedding.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
This is our fake wedding. This is our fake wedding.
This is yeah. We we sort of planned this episode
last minute just because we were excited about it. It's
a movie that we are I'm sure that we're making
a few prospective guests for this because I think so
many guests over like I would talk about Muriel's wedding like,
people are frothing for this episode. Oh yeah, and we're
happy to give it to you. And I am so

(02:56):
excited to hear what people's experience with this movie was,
because I just like, there's so much to talk about.
What a film? I know, what a film I not?
Wouldn't you say? So? This film came out in nineteen
ninety four. Ever heard of it?

Speaker 2 (03:14):
It was a lie?

Speaker 3 (03:15):
It is I believe me too, And it's brave of
us to say that. But this was directed by PJ. Hogan,
who was like, who did so? He also did my
best friend's wedding, which we covered not too long ago
on this show, and by that, I mean I was
living in my current apartment, so it couldn't have been
too long ago.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
Very true. He also directed that Peter Pan movie that
you have discussed with enjoying jerem me.

Speaker 3 (03:44):
I was like, wow, he's coming up all over the place.
I also have been thinking a lot about Jason Isaacs,
who I believe plays Captain Hook in that Peter Pan. Yeah,
because Jason Isaacs is in the new season of White Lotus,
so he's kind of having and I was like, who
is that? And then it's like, oh right, Wig Luciu's

(04:04):
Malfoy's dad. I was like, what's his name? What's his name? Wig?
In my head, Jason Isaac's name.

Speaker 2 (04:11):
Is Wig long blond Wig.

Speaker 3 (04:12):
Yeah, I didn't know him before he was Wig.

Speaker 4 (04:16):
P J.

Speaker 2 (04:17):
Hogan also directed Confessions of a Schoppaholic, which I have
also not seen.

Speaker 3 (04:22):
I haven't either. I know that people have and listeners
correct me from wrong. People have a lot of love
for that movie, but it seems more nostalgic than it
being good, might imagine. I can't say I read the
Confessions of the Chapoholic books when I was a kid,
because they had like a lot of sex in them,

(04:44):
and I think my mom let me take them out
of the library because she thought they were princess Diary's
books because the covers look similar, you know, both very
feminine titles. And but like I learned how to I
value those. But I don't remember a thing that happened,
but it's how I remember. It's how I learned about
fucking and credit card debt, two things I have since experienced.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
Congratulations, thank you.

Speaker 3 (05:10):
Thank you. And I couldn't have done it without my
friend Chappaholic.

Speaker 2 (05:15):
I learned about fucking via Judy.

Speaker 3 (05:18):
Bloom books, like the adult ones. Yeah, because she wrote Forever, Yes,
Forever was that's a very horny book, very horny.

Speaker 2 (05:26):
And then there's one called like Summer Sisters or something.
Remember that heavily references Abba. Relevant to today's discussion.

Speaker 3 (05:35):
I do have a quite I mean, how on earth
did because this was an independent film, how did they
afford Abba? I don't It was made for nine million dollars,
Like that's how much it costs to play three seconds
of dancing Queen. Now I wonder.

Speaker 2 (05:51):
I mean, I don't know, Mammy are ruined it for everyone?
I was gonna write Abba songs are that's too high.

Speaker 3 (05:59):
Now, that's it's very possible because I think this came
out before the musical, so maybe that was just what
let me. Yeah, because the musical came out in nineteen
ninety nine, so maybe Abba Wright's We're pretty cheap. And
I mean it's clear that no one in Australia in
nineteen ninety four had a good thing to say about them.

Speaker 2 (06:18):
Well especially Mary friends.

Speaker 3 (06:20):
Yeah, yeah, I mean you can tell where PJ. Hogan
stands because everyone who hates Abba is a bitch. What
an interesting movie. So yes, nineteen ninety four PJ. Hogan,
written and directed by I believe, his film debut, produced
by two women Brave, one of whom is Pj's his wife,

(06:41):
Jocelyn Moorehouse and a young actor who is pretty obscure
becomes a big stat from this movie. And an's Tony Kollett.

Speaker 2 (06:52):
That's so true, Jimmie, what is your relationship with this movie?

Speaker 3 (06:58):
I hadn't seen it and I have no idea why,
because it's like I think, maybe it's just like a
little Yeah, I guess it's like for the same reason
that I mean, I'm not comparing them, but they're like
for one thing, I thought this movie was a romantic comedy,
like I did not, And there I would say, it
is like, while it is coded as it seems like

(07:21):
it was marketed as a romantic comedy. I mean, I
look at the cover of this movie and I'm like.

Speaker 2 (07:26):
Oh, that's a rom com probably exactly.

Speaker 3 (07:29):
Like it's a I was. I was honestly like, is
this just like a boring highjinks thing? Like what is this?
This movie, I would say is pretty thoroughly devoid of
romantic love, but not devoid of love, but devoid of
romantic love, yes, but it is funny at many points.
I found it very sport but like, yeah, I just

(07:50):
hadn't seen it for whatever reason, for the same reason
that yeah, I think like Pretty Woman is a movie
that you'd think I would have seen by now, but
it was just like a little too old where I
don't think I grew up with anyone was like, you
gotta watch Muriel's wedding. But that's a damn shame, because
this movie I really enjoyed it. I've I don't even

(08:10):
like it's gonna be challenging to talk about because there's
so much that happens in this movie. I will say
and Okay, to be clear, I don't mean this as
a negative, but a lot of tonal whiplash where you're like,
it's this movie, No, it's this movie. It's a noora
for a few minutes, and then it's like a family

(08:33):
drama for the last ten minutes. It's like it's so
many different movies. It's also kind of like, I mean,
I would be shocked if people weren't, you know, sort
of in the way that fans, do, you know, rooting
for Muriel and Rohnda to realize they're in love with
each other. I don't know what PJ thinks of that,

(08:55):
but that's probably what should happen anyways. Yeah, I just
thought it was wild. Yeah, and also that this came
out during like a pretty cool moment for Australian independent
film because it came out right after the Adventures of Priscilla,
Queen of the Desert, So this was like a really
interesting time for Straine film. So true, what's your history

(09:19):
with this movie? Had you seen it?

Speaker 2 (09:22):
I had seen the first scene at the wedding at
the very beginning. Interesting, and I don't know why I
didn't keep watching. I think I like had to go
to a comedy show or something. But I watched it,
I think when I was still living in Boston with
my best friend, who I'm pretty sure is a big

(09:42):
fan of this movie, and he's like, I'm gonna put
this on, and then I watched the first scene and
then I like had to go. It's not that I
wasn't interested in continuing watching.

Speaker 3 (09:52):
It's also such a weird for it's such a weird
movie from the moment it begins, like I like, what
would you even leave? Being like where is this going
to go? Because it's like Urials getting arrested? Right.

Speaker 2 (10:05):
So I knew enough based on that first scene to
know that it was a movie about a woman who
we're supposed to kind of think is this you know,
like sad sack person, but we also like love her
and we're endeared to Muriel. But it's like it doesn't
start the way like that first scene. I was like,

(10:27):
oh this this probably isn't a standard rom calm based
on just like how things are being set up or
I couldn't really tell. But I never found out until
you know, yesterday what it was about, because I for
some reason didn't keep watching it at a later date.
But now I know. I've seen it twice now in
the past twenty four hours, and there's so much to discuss.

(10:52):
There's so much that happens. This is one of the
longest recaps I've ever written, just because so much happens
and it's hard to like gloss over things.

Speaker 3 (11:01):
I really liked. One of the many things I liked
about this movie is that even though there are like
I don't know, I mean, and maybe the recap will
prove me wrong because it is just such a vibes movie,
but even when characters sort of drop in and out,
they usually I thought that the script in the movie

(11:21):
was like much better than most movies about making sure
characters came back, making sure that people had a moment.
Someone who is referenced early on we meet later and
we get to see, even if it's like maybe very
sort of quick, but like you get to see sort
of like the humanity of a lot of stock rom

(11:43):
com characters, because it feels like this is a whole
movie about the like quote unquote loser best friend that
we see in so many romantic comedies, but this movie
is about her and about how everyone around her is
an asshole, like including her, Like I just yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:04):
She's got problems, but that's what makes the movie so like,
it's so good, authentic and endearing. H Yeah, it's like
if a movie focused on like the Judy Greer best
friend character of so many rom coms.

Speaker 3 (12:18):
Yeah, and then yeah, and if she had like huge
issues with her family. We'll get to the fare. But yeah,
I thought it was really good. I also kept writing
down real teeth. I just love people.

Speaker 2 (12:32):
No, no, uh, what's the fucking guy's name, Jerry Bruckheimer here?

Speaker 3 (12:38):
No, no, Lauren Michael's teeth, none of it, none of
it real real teeth. Also, Okay, the best example I
can think of of a bit character that I had
totally forgotten about and then she came back was that
lady Diane who hates shoplifting.

Speaker 2 (12:57):
Oh yeah, she's just.

Speaker 3 (12:59):
The same, The same woman gets both Muriel and her
mother arrested for a shoplifting. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (13:06):
She's like, I guess it's sort of like those secret shoppers, Yeah,
who just like goes to stores and like spies and
narcs on other customers for shoplifting.

Speaker 3 (13:19):
Yeah. I mean it's like, I get it that you've
got to work, but the least you can do is
be really bad at that job on purpose. Come on, absolutely?

Speaker 2 (13:26):
Yeah. Yeah, Well, in any case, shall we take a
quick break and then get into the ages long recap
that I've written.

Speaker 3 (13:34):
Let's do it.

Speaker 2 (13:35):
Okay, we'll be right back, and we're back. We'll place
a content warning here for suicide as well as family
abuse dynamics. Here's the recap of Muriel's wedding. I also like,

(14:00):
I'm like, am I saying this name right? Muriel Muriel?
And then later she calls herself Mariel.

Speaker 3 (14:05):
Like, it's Muriel Muriel. I think that that at least
that's the American pronunciation of it, okay, because that was
did you ever I know, I know the answer to this.
Did you ever watch Courage the Cowardly Dog?

Speaker 2 (14:18):
Were not at all?

Speaker 3 (14:20):
Well, there's a character named Muriel on that show. It's
spelled the same way, and she says it like that. Okay,
it's kind of an old time It's just like an
old fashioned name. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (14:31):
Well, my grandmother was named Miriam, so oh, okay, similar vibes.

Speaker 3 (14:36):
I knew. I knew a few mary El's. I definitely
didn't know any Muriels. Her husband's name was Eustace. This
cartoon I'm talking. Okay, so they they've just wear an
elderly cartoon characters.

Speaker 2 (14:48):
Got it, got it all right?

Speaker 3 (14:50):
I guess we should start.

Speaker 2 (14:53):
So we are in a place called Porpoise Spit Australia.
Ever heard of it? No, because it's a made up.

Speaker 3 (15:02):
Place, such a funny big name.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
We meet Muriel has Slop, played by Tony Kullette, at
her friend's wedding, not her best friend's wedding, just her
regular friend's wedding. She has caught the bouquet Mariel has
and she's delighted because she loves weddings. She desperately wants
to get married. The whole marriage and wedding thing is

(15:29):
like very up her alley. Yeah, but all of her
very mean friends such as Tanya, Cheryl, Nicole, there's another
one whose name I didn't catch. They're like, eh, Muriel
caught the bouquet. There's no way she'll be the next
one to get married. She's never even had a boyfriend, Mariel,

(15:51):
you should give the bouquet to someone else. They're also
commenting on how she didn't even buy a new dress
for this wedding, and she's like, yes, I did.

Speaker 3 (16:00):
And then it's like, well, yes and no, I love
I love her. I just like she's impossible not to
root for, even when she's being a real piece of shit.
I just Tony Kalett is so good and the writing is,
I thought, really good.

Speaker 2 (16:16):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
I just this movie weirdly made me like my best
friend's wedding more just because I knew it was the same.
It's not that I really want to watch it again,
but I know that that our whole discussion around that
movie was sort of like they were trying to go
for something but it didn't quite happen, right, And I
feel like they're trying to go something for something different,
but they're trying to go for something here that is

(16:38):
also weirdly wedding related, right, But the difference is it
works in this movie really well. Right.

Speaker 2 (16:44):
It seems like PJ. Hogan has a vested interest in
subverting traditional wedding oriented narratives, and what he ends up
doing with My best Friend's wedding I appreciate to some extent, but.

Speaker 3 (17:01):
It also just feels like it's so Hollywood, and it
seems like this movie is presumably completely within his control
because it's fairly low budget. It's I don't know. Yeah,
I wasn't able to fight a lot of information of
like was he But I'm assuming because it's like a
husband wife, you know, producing to it, like creatively, there

(17:21):
was a lot more freedom to make some like weird
choices because this movie makes so many weird choices.

Speaker 2 (17:27):
It really does. Yeah, And then there's a quick moment
where Muriel goes inside and sees the groom whose name
is Chuck.

Speaker 3 (17:37):
You're like and maybe maybe that's the name. Maybe we're
not sure.

Speaker 2 (17:42):
And he's having sex with not the bride but one
of the bride's friends, Nicole, and like Muriel sees them
like secretly having sex in the laundry room. Then there's
this whole thing where that woman, I guess her name
is what is it Diane. She's like the secret shopper
like store detective lady who accuses Maryel of stealing the

(18:05):
dress that she's wearing.

Speaker 3 (18:07):
I am just like my enemy, my enemy Diane.

Speaker 2 (18:12):
The cops get involved, but Muriel's dad, Bill Heslop played
by Bill Hunter, who was also in Priscilla, Queen of
the Desert, and he's in another movie that we watched
recently together. We haven't covered it on the podcast yet,
but strictly ballroom.

Speaker 3 (18:28):
I mean he is Australia.

Speaker 2 (18:31):
Yeah, he is like a city council member or something.
He works in government.

Speaker 3 (18:39):
It seems like he's a city council member who aspires
to a bigger political career. Yes. Yeah, he's a climber
and he's a piece of shit.

Speaker 2 (18:48):
He's the worst person. He kind of like butters up
the cops to get Muriel out of trouble after stealing
this dress. Then we cut to Muriel having dinner with
her family. Her dad and her mom, Betty played by
Genie Drynen, are there, along with Muriel's like three or

(19:09):
four siblings. Her dad is carrying on about his various
business dealings. He seems to be like a real estate
developer or he like grants permits to people who build
these like resorts and stuff like that.

Speaker 3 (19:25):
I was not exactly sure, yeah, because I was like,
whatever he was doing, it's shady as fuck. Yeah, he
was doing illegally. But like he I mean, and this
is like a through line to the movie as it
turns out, but like he's such a liar that I
was not even sure what he was supposed to.

Speaker 2 (19:42):
Have been doing, right, Yeah, I don't really, I don't understand.

Speaker 3 (19:45):
He's like, I don't take bribes, I mean agreements, And
I was like, for what, like it just was I
don't know, I don't have that in me. I'm just like,
it's too confusing. You're calling things other can't do it.

Speaker 2 (19:58):
We just know he's sleazy.

Speaker 3 (20:00):
Yeah, and he's hearing on oh that day draft, like
whenever he screams across any room day draft. Yeah. The
woman he's gonna leave her for. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (20:09):
Yeah, So there's that. There's he talks about how he
like ran for state government once but lost. That'll kind
of come back later. We also learn that Muriel dropped
out of high school. She's currently unemployed and has been
for a couple of years. Her dad calls Muriel and
her siblings useless and dead weight. And then this is

(20:32):
when a friend of Bill's comes over to the table.
This is a beauty consultant named Deirdre who.

Speaker 3 (20:39):
Is basically running an MLM. It sounds like like a
ninety era mL.

Speaker 2 (20:44):
It's not Avon, it's not Mary Kay, but it's something
like it.

Speaker 3 (20:48):
It's the Australian fictional variant of this right, but.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
Deirdre offers Muriel a job. The next night, Muriel goes
out to drinks with her friends, her mean girl friends,
including the bride from the wedding, Tanya, who's crying because
her husband is already having an affair, but not.

Speaker 3 (21:08):
With the person that Muriel knows with. It's a different affair,
which just unfortunately, like pretty funny when you see, like
when you see I think it's Nicole, react to like, wait,
he's cheating on me to yet another person.

Speaker 2 (21:24):
Yeah, And her friends tell Tanya to forget about her
husband and go on holiday with them to Hibiscus Island.

Speaker 3 (21:33):
This is the lot to Sex and the City the movie.

Speaker 2 (21:36):
Oh my gosh, you're right. Yeah, I didn't even think
about that.

Speaker 3 (21:40):
Yeah, it's like if they had a friend that they
verbally abused almost to death. Fortunately, among their crimes, that's
not one of them. There's not a random fift but
it really did feel like the cast of Sex and
the City plus Tony Collette, and everyone's screaming at Tony
Collett to shut up.

Speaker 2 (21:56):
Right, because what has happened is that Maryel's friends had
planned a vacation without inviting Mauriel, and then they tell
her that they don't want Muriel hanging around with them
anymore because she doesn't fit in with the image that
they've cultivated. She doesn't wear the right clothes or hairstyles.
They fat shame her, and they also just simply don't

(22:17):
like who she is as a person. Mauriel naturally starts
crying and she says.

Speaker 3 (22:23):
I'm not nothing. It's so we're like, oh, Mariel, yeah,
like this this movie is very depressing. Do yeah. However,
I think it's so like bravely. I think Tony Kallett
is very talented, but it is wild how they managed
to balance the tone in the scene that like, your
heart is breaking for her, and the scene is still

(22:45):
a little bit funny because they're in this like loud
tiki bar, and the friends are so tone deaf that
when they're like, oh, yeah, I'm Muriel. We didn't invite
you on vacation because we hate you and we hate
everything about you. And then I think Tanya turns the
subject back to herself and Muriel's still crying, and then

(23:06):
she's like, could you stop making it about yourself? Muriel?
Like It's like it still manages to be funny in
this very depressed but in a way that isn't taking
swings at our love of Muriel, which is I feel like,
really hard to do. And yeah, I mean we'll we'll
talk about the the you know that group of gals.

(23:27):
But I just it made me because, especially as the
movie goes on, it just feels like when you start
to realize the sort of unending depths of self hatred
that Muriel has for herself, that it's like she's saying,
I'm not nothing like almost more to herself than to
these women, and it's totally it's really sad. I no, oh,

(23:49):
it breaks your heart. And then don't worry. It's gonna
work out for her everyone. It's gonna also watch the movie.
It's streaming on Paramount Plus. But it's gonna work out
for her everybody.

Speaker 2 (23:58):
Yeah, but a few really the horrible things will happen first, I.

Speaker 3 (24:02):
Mean, isn't if that's not life best case scenario.

Speaker 2 (24:08):
Okay, So her friends have dumped her. The next day,
Muriel's mom, Betty, gives Muriel a blank check so that
she can buy makeup kids from Deirdre to resell because
it is this like MLM scheme. Muriel tells her mom
that she's gonna get married and be successful so that

(24:28):
her parents can be proud of her.

Speaker 3 (24:30):
And there's a line that and there's also I again
just like a character that I'm used to seeing in
passing in rom comms, the like, for lack of a
better description, depressed mother, and we end up getting I mean,
it doesn't get much happier, but there is a lot
of depth that we get with her mother that I
wasn't expecting, and I was like pretty pleasantly surprised by

(24:54):
just the amount that the plot is considering her. But
there's a line she says in that scene that again
just broke my heart because it becomes I feel like
it's clear at the beginning, but it becomes clearer and
clearer as the movie goes on that Muriel's mother's coping
technique is denial and like shutting herself off to the

(25:16):
parts of reality that are upsetting, even when that hurts
through children. Basically, there's a line that she says that
just brought my heart where she's like, your dad just
wants to be proud of you, and you're just her
phrasing it that way, you're just like, ah, I would
steal all your money too, totally, which is what Muriel does.

Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yes, because we cut to Hibiscus Island, which is a
very small island off the north west coast of Australia.
This is where Muriel's friends are or former friends I
should say, are on vacation. They look over and see Muriel,

(25:56):
who has clearly used that blank check that her mom
gave her to treat herself to a holiday, and the
other women are furious that Mauriel is there. That night,
she runs into someone she went to high school with,
Ronda played by Rachel Griffiths. Maryel makes up a lie

(26:18):
and tells Ronda that she's engaged to someone named Tim Simms.

Speaker 3 (26:23):
They I and you will be shocked how long Tim
Simms is canonically real in this friendship.

Speaker 5 (26:30):
It seems like a month and months. She's like, what
do you mean you would get a married Tim Simms?
It's somehow even funnier in the accent, like.

Speaker 3 (26:43):
It's just I love it. It's it's her. I don't know
why I'm feeling so referencing today, but her, what is it?
Astronaut Mike Dexter, like just a made up boyfriend from
thirty Rock. Yes, that's Muriel's Tim Simms.

Speaker 2 (26:58):
I'm also reminded of I forget which Brady Bunch movie,
but it's like the ones that Christine Taylor is in them.
They were like big staples of my youth. And Marcia
at one point makes up a boyfriend named George Glass.
So I love a lot like that.

Speaker 3 (27:19):
I mean, because it's also and I appreciate that it's
made clearer in Muriel's wedding. Then I think it's been
in most because I mean, god knows how many movies
we've covered that have been like a relationship predicated on
a lie. But I am giving this movie a pass
because it's a friendship. No, But also it is, like

(27:42):
is made so clear to us why Muriel's doing what
she's doing. It doesn't excuse her from being dishonest with
people who especially people like Ronda, who actually care about her,
but it's very clear that this lie is coming from
a place of insecurity, which is like most of the

(28:03):
times in you know, my life where that lie has
been made to me, or like when I was in
high school from me is because you're insecure and like
you want to seem cool and yeah, I don't know.
We just covered Ryleyan on the show, and there's a
similar thing there where it's just like, oh, I'm only

(28:24):
going to see this person for one night. Let me
just let them believe in the best version of myself
that doesn't exist yet totally, and then you always end
up entering a domestic partnership with this person. But what
can you do? Right? It is?

Speaker 2 (28:38):
It is very different from the standard like rom com.
Oh it's a it's a bet, or it's some kind
of goofy lie to trick someone into thinking I'm not
writing an article about them or whatever it is. Right,
the context here is totally different, and it's rooted in
something far more real, zembling real life, because I've met

(29:03):
so many people like Muriel who I like, of course,
either don't know they're lying or I can tell they're
lying about something, but I understand why they're doing it,
because yeah, they're they're insecure, They're they're doing the like
fake it till you make it thing, and you know.

Speaker 3 (29:20):
It's the classic like I have a boyfriend who lives
in Canada, like yeah, and some people carry that energy
far into their adulthood and Muriel is I mean she's not,
I mean not far into her adulthood. Tony Kollette I
think is like twenty two in this movie. Yeah, but
you know she and also as as it becomes more

(29:42):
obvious and like, I don't know if it hit for
you right away and I'm just have a brain full
of rocks. But it's also like Muriel has seen her
parents use lying in denial as coping strategies her whole life,
and so it makes a lot of sense that that
would be her go to for sure.

Speaker 2 (30:02):
Yeah. Yeah, So this is the lie that maryel tells
Ronda about her fiance Tim Sims. Sims and the two
of them get to talking about Tanya and Tanya's friends
and how they were so cruel to Ronda in high school,
and Mariel is like, well, surprise, they're right over there.

(30:25):
So Ronda approaches them and Tanya is like, oh, why
don't you have a drink with us? And Ronda is
basically like no, thanks, you killy had beach.

Speaker 3 (30:35):
By the way, love, Like this speed with which Ronda
wins you over is like unreal, It's so great.

Speaker 2 (30:46):
Yeah, and she's like, by the way, your friend Nicole
is fucking your husband. And also I'm gonna go hang
out with my new friend Maryel By like mic drop.

Speaker 3 (30:57):
Cut to and also, if you haven't seen the movie,
important that you know that Muriel's obsessed with Abba. Cut
to them doing an amazing karaoke scene in Waterloo, and
then you're like, oh, this movie is weird, weird like this,
it's it's great. Also, my best friend's wedding features an

(31:19):
extended karaoke scene. Another PJ.

Speaker 2 (31:22):
Hogan, Wait, is it the one where they're at the
like rehearsal dinner or some like wedding.

Speaker 3 (31:28):
Over Julia am I thinking they're wrong movie Ulis can't
sing and then they follow.

Speaker 2 (31:34):
No, Cameron Diaz can't sing. Oh yes, yes, at karaoke.
But then there's another scene where like a whole group
of people are singing at some dinner. Yeah, we're talking
about twoffer different scenes. But now I remember the karaoke scene.

Speaker 4 (31:45):
P J.

Speaker 3 (31:46):
Hogan loves a weird karaoke slash bar fight scene.

Speaker 2 (31:51):
Yeah, because what happens is like Rhnda and Muriel are
like bringing down the house with their Waterloo performance.

Speaker 3 (31:58):
The outfits. It's just awesome. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (32:01):
Meanwhile, Tanya and her friends are there and they're having
a horrible time, and then Tanya and Nicole start beating
each other up. Cut to Maryel's family. They're reading a
postcard from Muriel saying that she's funding this expensive vacation
with all the cosmetics she's selling. Diadra hears about this

(32:22):
and knows that Muriel's lying. Also, there's speculation that Muriel's
dad and Deirdre are having an affair. I can't remember
if I've made that clear yet or not.

Speaker 3 (32:32):
Yes, yeah, And it becomes increasingly obvious as time goes on,
for sure, because she just always happens to be in
the same restaurant. I love that that's there. It seems
like truly their system is I will go to the
nearest Chinese restaurant, and then you also go there, because
we see that happen in multiple cities, Like that's clearly

(32:55):
just their thing that they.

Speaker 2 (32:56):
Do something and he's always like, oh, what a cool
and she's like hi, yeah yeah. So back to Muriel.
She's still on vacation, hanging out with Ronda, who reassures
Marriel that she is somebody. She's successful in Timstons wants
to marry her. Shortly after this, Muriel returns home very

(33:20):
briefly because it seems like her family is missing. Twelve
thousand dollars and they rightfully suspect Muriel of stealing it.
So she turns right back around and heads to Sydney,
where Ronda lives. She moves in with her.

Speaker 3 (33:34):
It's a very sad scene, but it's also very funny
that Muriel walks in the house with these like pretty
gnarly tan lines too. She has like the outline of
sunglasses on her face, which I thought was a funny touch.
And then her poor mother is like always wanting to
give her the benefit of the doubt, and it's like,

(33:54):
you didn't do it right. You wouldn't do that. You're awesome,
and Muriel's like, yeah, gotta go and running back. I mean,
I mean, yeah, I was laughing.

Speaker 2 (34:06):
It's funny.

Speaker 3 (34:07):
You sun block. Oh my god. People in the nineties
were so stressful. Please use sunblock for the love of god.

Speaker 2 (34:14):
Yeah, okay. So Muriel moves to Sydney. She's still lying
to Ronda about having been engaged, although now she's saying
that her ex fiance, Tim Sims is a cop, and
so she's changing her name to Mariel with an A
to hide from him.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
And I like that. I mean, it's definitely like naive
of Ronda, But I also just like appreciate how game
she is for like whatever Muriel's up to where she
says and she means it. She's like, oh, you know
when she meets him, she's like, oh, are you are
you trying to like have one last fling before you
get married to Tim Simms. I won't tell anybody. Yeah,

(34:57):
And then and then she's like, oh, are you changing
your name? Because Tim Sims is a homicidal X cop.
I won't tell anybody. And it's like she is. She's
a true friend.

Speaker 2 (35:10):
She's loyal.

Speaker 3 (35:11):
She's loyal even when it's like, come on, read back
what you just said. But they're young.

Speaker 2 (35:18):
They're young, yeah, early twenties. Yeah, yeah, Okay. So Maryel
now works at a video rental store and one night
she goes out to a dance club with a customer
named Bryce, who had like come into the video store
and asked her out on a date. She brings him
back home, where Ronda is having allowed threesome in the

(35:41):
other room. Maryel and Bryce start making out. She's shrieking
with laughter, and then there's all this okay high jinks.

Speaker 3 (35:50):
Well, okay, we have to slow this scene down because
this scene I was like, I had to watch it
like three times. It so much happens. Some of it
is very high, some of it is very serious. The
giggly stuff I was really confused about because I was
sort of wondering because what happens right before they start
making out and like we'll get into this where you know,

(36:11):
it is very nineties and ascribing to like no consent discussions,
nothing like that. Right like they're vibing, but he comes
on pretty strong. I thought, sure, And she's laughing and
it's unclear. I sort of was like, is it nervous
or excited laughter? Because what happens right before they start
making out is she sees her dad on tv ye

(36:33):
say like Muriel, come home. We don't care about the money,
And so I was like, is she having a panic attack?
Like or is this but and it's like it's genuinely
and it's you know whatever. It doesn't need to be
directly clear to me, but I was like, I just
felt to me, I was like reading that as like
she was just like so overwhelmed by so many things
happening at once, where I was like, this is an

(36:55):
either her first or one of her first sexual experiences
and she's like excited about it but also nervous, and
also her dad is on TV looking for her, and
also there's a three way going on five feet away,
and it's just like it seems like she just like
sort of her brain breaks a little bit and she's
like yeah, right, and then hijinks and then cancer and

(37:17):
you're like.

Speaker 2 (37:18):
All it's a spin of like two minutes. It's so
much jam packed into one small moment.

Speaker 3 (37:24):
While Yeah, I was.

Speaker 2 (37:25):
Thinking about, like, the context we learned earlier in the
beginning of the movie is that Maryel's never had a boyfriend.
That doesn't mean she's never had any sexual experiences, but
it also might mean that she hasn't.

Speaker 3 (37:36):
We don't know.

Speaker 2 (37:37):
We don't know for sure.

Speaker 3 (37:38):
We're not sure. It does seem like Muriel has a
hyperfixation on monogamy that would suggest that maybe she hasn't
had it, but we again, we just don't know.

Speaker 2 (37:47):
Canonically hard to say yeah. But then yeah, there's this
like high jinxy kind of slapstick moment where Bryce, intending
to like unzip her pants, he accidentally unzips the bean
bag chair and all of the beans spill out. Then
the two dudes who Ronda is fucking come out naked

(38:10):
with their dicks out, and every time, like and why
Maryel sees them, she shrieks some more. But like in
a again, we're just like how.

Speaker 3 (38:20):
It just seems like she it's like she she's very
hard to read this scene. I was like, how are
you feeling? I don't know. Yeah, And also I'm like
it happened so suddenly that I'm like, why did they attack?

Speaker 2 (38:37):
I'm guessing they heard her shrieking shrieking, and then they're like,
what are you doing to her? So the two other
guys like pin Bryce down, thinking that maybe he was
assaulting Muriel, and then Ronda comes out and then suddenly
Ronda's like, I can't feel my legs.

Speaker 3 (38:59):
Cut to so the er, that scene is exactly as
chaotic as you just described, Like it is an experience
watching that scene.

Speaker 2 (39:07):
Yeah, it's a lot. And then in the er in
the hospital, it turns out that Ronda has a cancerous
tumor that is pressing on her spine. That's why she
couldn't feel her legs and she needs to have surgery
immediately to have the tumor removed.

Speaker 3 (39:24):
Not to over cancer this discussion so much, but I
did it did make me. I was curious, like how
intentionally this was done. And apologies if you're an oncologist
or a lover of oncologists, But the scene where she
finds out that she has cancer and the oncologist sort

(39:44):
of just drops that word into the conversation and she's like, wait,
I have cancer and he's like, yeah, yeah, duh. Like
that has been my experience with most oncologists, like when
I was taking care of my dad over a course
of years, where there's sometimes this and I get it,
we're dumb, but like you have to say, like, okay,

(40:07):
first things first, you have cancer, not just like okay,
so here's what we have to do. We have to
do on this timeline. Uh yeah, idiot, it's obviously cancer.
I'm like, it's not best side manner. Where where is it? Anyways?
I just felt weirdly validated by that experience and the
doctor be like, oh, well, yeah, it's obviously cancer. Like

(40:28):
you know, you have to say that, you have to
say that.

Speaker 2 (40:31):
You have to use your words. I mean, I've talked
at length on various podcasts and episodes of this show
about my kind of distrust of the American healthcare system.
But yeah, I found that a lot of doctors are
not very good at communication, so no, and then there
they should work on that.

Speaker 3 (40:50):
Yeah, anyways, there it is a very uh again, just
like one of the many kind of abrupt like pace
changes in the movie where it goes from like, oh,
like Muriel's about to have a fun hookup with her
crush to her best friend has cancer. And I just

(41:15):
again was like so impressed that even though the like
whatever gradient of things that happen is so all over
the place, it never stops being a comedy. Right, but
I'm sort of confused as to how that was even possible.
But yeah, it's like, I mean, Rohnda has to have
this surgery and and it seems that, you know, Muriel

(41:38):
is her main source of support.

Speaker 2 (41:41):
Mm hmm. Yeah, this will become clear in a few
moments before that, Muriel calls home and finds out that
her dad has left her mom and is currently in
Sydney as well, facing an inquiry for accepting bra vibes
after Muriel stole their money. But you also get the

(42:04):
impression that he's been accepting bribes his entire career, so
it's like not a new.

Speaker 3 (42:09):
Thing, and that right, and that it's just like this,
it happens to be the thing that people caught up on.
And also, I mean, it becomes clearer as the movie
goes on that her dad is always doing things that
seem altruistic but are without fail to improve his own position,
which you know, because at first I was kind of

(42:30):
surprised when he goes on TV and he's like, Muriel,
we love you, we're you know, we don't care about
the money. But then it's like, oh, he was doing
that to make him more sympathetic in this big court
case he was about to go through. He's like, he
doesn't mean a word that he says, which we learn
in even more kind of gruesome detail as the movie
goes on.

Speaker 2 (42:49):
For sure. So then, and this is maybe to help
Muriel cope with this news of her friend being diagnosed
with CAM. But she goes into a wedding dress shop
to try on a gown. She tells the shopkeepers that
she's marrying her fiance Bill in September.

Speaker 3 (43:12):
Which is also like, ugh, that's her dad's name, Muriel,
don't say.

Speaker 2 (43:17):
That, yeah, stick with Tim Sims. She also said her
story straight lady. She also says that her mom can't
come because she's in the hospital with a tumor on
her spine aka what's going on with Rohnda. And by
now we realize that Muriel is a serial liar. I mean, yeah,

(43:38):
that was pretty clear from the jump, but it's like
now happened several times.

Speaker 3 (43:44):
But I feel like that's the first example where it's
clear that like lying is her coping mechanism because it's
like she can't talk about she finds it really difficult
to talk about what is actually bothering her, so she
makes up weird lies that reference what is bothering right.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
Yeah, she's pulling from source material aka other people in
her life and then making up stories to make herself
seem sympathetic. And it works. Yeah, because the shopkeeper out
of section, they take photos of her in the dress,
which Mariel puts in a wedding photo album, which we'll

(44:22):
come back in a moment. Meanwhile, Ronda is in physical therapy.
She's learning how to walk again. She's incredibly frustrated because
she's unable to do much for herself. Mariel has to
take care of her. But Mariiel's like, I don't mind,
this is the best my life has ever been. It's
as good as an Abba song.

Speaker 3 (44:45):
That made me tear up. That was really beautiful.

Speaker 2 (44:49):
Yeah. But then and then Ronda makes Muriel promise that
they'll never go back to their hometown of Porpoise Spit
and she's like.

Speaker 3 (44:59):
Yeah, which I will say is for even though Ronda
is the best character in the movie, I think, and
she's the realist. I wonder if it's like if it's
a youth thing or but like, I don't know that
she necessarily realized what a big ask that is, and
that it was sort of like said and not to

(45:20):
say that Muriel wouldn't have done it or I mean,
because it's like caretaking and like assisting is like one
of the most important jobs that exists. But it was
just I felt a little bit for Muriel in that
moment where it's like, well, what do you say in
that situation? Even if you have reservations, you don't want
to seem like you're turning your back on your friend, right,

(45:41):
So it was I felt for both of them in
that situation, because of course it's like Ronda needs a
lifeline badly because she was They literally bonded over hating
where they came from right, But then in the same way,
it's like, that's a lot of pressure, particularly on a
new friendship, and so I just really felt for both

(46:02):
of them.

Speaker 2 (46:03):
Yeah, they've only known each other for a few months.

Speaker 3 (46:06):
Yeah, maybe, like and so it's like that is a
really steep escalation, you know, but that's I mean, god,
I again, it's just like obviously very specific circumstances, but like, oh,
two friends in their early twenties and a weirdly codependent friendship.

(46:27):
Many such cases, many such cases, indeed.

Speaker 2 (46:31):
Yes, So one day Ronda sees this wedding photo album
that Maryel has been compiling, and apparently she's been filling
it with dozens of photos of her in different wedding
dresses at various bridal shops across Sydney. And then Ronda

(46:51):
catches her red handed, like in the middle of trying
on a dress and assumes that Maryel has gotten back
together with Tim's Sims. And this is the moment where
Maryel finally admits that there is no Tim Simms. She
made him up, and she's doing that because she just

(47:12):
desperately wants to get married, because if she gets married,
she'll be someone else. Because Maryel hates herself.

Speaker 3 (47:20):
And that is the moment in the movie. Room'm like, oh,
this movie is so good. It's like directly confronting how
we're conditioned to see marriage to some extent where a
lot of people are conditioned to see marriage is as
like if you can do this, everything will be okay.
When look at literally any marriage, it's so demonstrably untrue

(47:45):
and like and the fact that like Ronda is so
awesome in that scene, and we'll talk about like the
conversations around ableism in this movie too, but like the
fact that she, you know, is like get out of
it because she's so afraid for Muriel and thinks that
Muriel's re entering this abusive relationship right, And it's just

(48:05):
like it's so emotionally charged and there's too much going
on in their respective lives for them to be able
to show up for each other in the way that
they need to. And it's just like a ough it was.
That scene is so heartbreaking and then also still somehow
funny at the end because Ronda storms out and it's

(48:26):
just like the two employees at the Bridle shop and
a sobbing Tony Kollett and they're like hmmm, so what
do we do?

Speaker 2 (48:34):
So we need that dress back now?

Speaker 3 (48:36):
Right, It's still like always there manages to be a
comedic button on these like devastating scenes.

Speaker 2 (48:43):
It's wilds yeah for sure. Okay, So sometime later, Muriel
meets up with her dad in Sydney. He berates her
for stealing his money. Deirdre just happens to come into
the restaurant, Oh my God, and she and Bill confirm
that they're in love and that Bill has effectively left

(49:07):
Muriel's mom Betty for Deirdre. Bill also tells Muriel that
she has to move back in with her mom and
she has like a few weeks to do it to
avoid having to move back to Porpoise spit. Muriel goes
through personal ads looking for men who are looking for

(49:27):
a his wife.

Speaker 3 (49:29):
And this is like the maybe third or fourth time
that the.

Speaker 4 (49:33):
Movie just likes a big name, totally different movie where
it's like that this is the beginning of a this
is the first act of a different movie.

Speaker 3 (49:43):
If we're like well into the second act of this movie.

Speaker 1 (49:47):
Now.

Speaker 3 (49:48):
I just thought it was like it was pretty pretty
awesome because that premise feels weirdly like old school rom
comie of like I need to do this and so
I guess I have to get married. Like that's the
oldest rom com trope in the book.

Speaker 2 (50:05):
So I thought when I was watching this yesterday, yeah,
for the first time, aside from that first scene I
had already watched years and years and years ago. I
thought that the premise of the movie was going to
be that after she catches the bouquet at this wedding
and all her friends are like, you'll never be the
next one to get married, that Maryel will like go

(50:27):
on a journey like just be hell bent on getting
married to prove those friends wrong. And that is kind
of what happens. But that's not even necessarily her specific goal,
like other a lot of other things happen to like
get her on this path of this marriage that she
eventually has, which we're about to get to.

Speaker 3 (50:48):
But like, well, it's like because it's like the real
inciting incident of this movie is meeting Ronda, Like that's
what really changes things. It feels like I don't know,
I feel like it's clear by the end that it's like,
you know, platonic or not, Like Ronda is the great
love of Muriel's life. And vice versa, even though you

(51:08):
know they both make their mistakes, Muriel more than Ronda.
But yeah, yeah, that scene, it's so I don't even
know what I thought this movie. I thought it was
literally just like my wedding is next week, aha, because
that's so many movies like they're like, I guess it's

(51:29):
one of those. But it's just so twisty turney this
is to me when it turns into it accidentally turns
into like sort of an aura for like ten minutes
where it's like, there's this rich guy from a foreign
country that you know nothing about. You're gonna marry him,

(51:53):
but it's not serious, and you're like, I know this.

Speaker 2 (51:55):
One right, because here's what happens. So she finds a
personal ad that seems promising, so she goes to respond
to it. Meanwhile, Ronda reveals that her cancer has come
back and that she'll never walk again, and Ronda's mom
is insisting that she does move back home to Porpoise Spit.

(52:16):
Muriel's too wrapped up in this other thing to really
bother with what Ronda's dealing with. That's because Muriel.

Speaker 3 (52:24):
My read of that was like it almost felt like
Muriel was like mirroring her mom a little bit in
that sequence where the situation going on around her was
too overwhelming and so she kind of like detaches from
it and does something else because originally, I guess I
misinterpreted it the first time I watched this sequence where

(52:45):
I thought that like Muriel had all of it, like
she wants to, say, in Sydney because she doesn't want
to be in this toxic family dynamic, but she also
wants to be in Sydney because she loves Rhonda and
wants to be there to support her, And so I
sort of thought part of the reason she was seeking
out this marriage arrangement was so that she could continue

(53:06):
to be around Ronda. But then Ronda is you know,
when Ronda's mom sort of puts her foot down and
is like, no, you're coming home, it seems like Muriel
just freaks out and kind of detaches instead of fighting
for Ronda in that moment, which is like very relatable
for someone in their early twenties and over their head,

(53:27):
but it's so heartbreaking where it's like Ronda needed someone
so badly to show up for her.

Speaker 2 (53:33):
Yeah, and Muriel is at this juncture in her life
not the person to be able to do it.

Speaker 3 (53:41):
No, she like can't manage her own shit.

Speaker 2 (53:44):
No, not at all. But she does manage to meet
this man who is looking for his wife. His name
is David van Arkle and he's a swimmer who's trying
to compete in the Olympics for Australia because he's from
South Africa and there's a long history of South Africa

(54:04):
being banned from the Olympics for being an apartheid state. Like,
so he needs to marry an Australian woman to get
like a green card or whatever the equivalent is, so
that he can swim for Australia, and his family is
willing to pay Muriel ten thousand dollars to marry this guy.

Speaker 3 (54:23):
Which is just like a totally different movie. It's like
it's just so wild how what it intends, Like tonal
Shift that is again.

Speaker 2 (54:37):
And so she meets this guy David, and Muriel's swooning
over him because he's hot, handsome, and he's got a
good physique and stuff.

Speaker 3 (54:44):
But to the point where it's like he doesn't she doesn't,
or maybe she's so accustomed to being negged in front
of her very eyes, because that's how her father, acts.

Speaker 2 (54:52):
And her friend, her former friends and her friends.

Speaker 3 (54:55):
Just like she's just so used to being negged to
her face that David is like yucky, I don't like
her to his like weird coach, and Muriel's like.

Speaker 2 (55:07):
Whatever, I'm like no, right. She seems thrilled at the
idea of marrying him. He seems repulsed by her, but
she breezes past that and.

Speaker 3 (55:19):
He'll give her, you know, ten thousand dollars that will
allow her to extract herself from this financial obligation to
her family.

Speaker 2 (55:25):
So yeah, so whin when so a wedding gets arranged
between Muriel and David and there's a lot of media
attention around it since David is this like star athlete,
so she like gets in the tabloids and stuff like that.
Cut to the wedding, Ronda is reluctantly there with her mother, Tanya,

(55:48):
Cheryl and those women are there is Muriel's bridesmaids because
they kind of came crawling back.

Speaker 3 (55:55):
That made my blood boil. I was so mad at
Muriel in that moment for because you're like, oh, she
grow up, she needs to grow up like she does. Yeah,
she does. Honestly, I was like nice of Ronda to
even show up.

Speaker 2 (56:10):
She's there quite reluctantly.

Speaker 3 (56:12):
It also feels like Ronda's doing something that like I've
never done this at a wedding, but I've definitely done
it at various events, just like showing up to be
like here I am and how bad does it feel
to see me right now? Yeah, it feels like Ronda's
pulling one of those and I respect that totally.

Speaker 2 (56:30):
So they're there. Bryce is there for some reason.

Speaker 3 (56:35):
Again, just like another character that we really only encounter
once or twice, who is given. I thought like sort
of this deeper lore by showing up later where it
seems like he first of all, he's dressed like he's
going to a funeral, which felt intentional. He's wearing all black,
and I think it's implied that like he's upset things
didn't work out between him and Muriel, and like he

(56:56):
seems really sad that she's getting married to someone else. Yeah,
which is just a lot of lare. Even though he
never speaks again, I don't think, No.

Speaker 2 (57:07):
He doesn't. We don't see him on screen. I don't
think after this either, sometimes I was like, maybe I
don't really get Australian humor. Is this supposed to be
a joke?

Speaker 3 (57:16):
I think so. I mean I feel like the whole
the whole wedding is like a combination of being a joke,
but it's also like it's I found it genuinely unsettling
to watch, Like though it is kind of like a
horror movie in the way it plays out.

Speaker 2 (57:33):
It's yeah, it does kind of remind you of Carrie
in like the prompt scene where she's like so excited
to have one prom queen. Meanwhile, maryel is like grinning
ear to ear. This is like her what she has
been conditioned to think is supposed to be like, you know,
the happiest day of her life. And she's so ecstatic

(57:55):
she's getting married, which is what she's always wanted. And
it doesn't matter that it's a sham marriage to a
man who is disgusted by her. She's still like.

Speaker 3 (58:03):
It's it's devastating. And the way, and again it is
like the way Tony Kleett like manages to straddle how
tragic that is with how funny she is. We're like
the huge spile and the like yeah, la like contrasted
with people looking like they're at a funeral, like it's

(58:23):
really unsettling and a little bit funny, and it's yeah,
it is like I feel like the Carrie. That's a
really good comparison and like somehow even worse than that,
because we know that Muriel views marriage as a path
to feeling seen and feeling validated and as a potential

(58:44):
way to love herself. It's not like she doesn't fully
understand that the marriage is fake, Like she knows that
that's not something that she's going to be confronted by later.
That was like in the text. So it's like she's
smiling because she's and thinks that she's about to be
able to love herself for the first time. It has

(59:06):
like which isn't you know whatever. I mean, they're doing
a business transaction. I don't really care about David's apartheid
ass feelings so like, but but it's like she knows
what's happening and is still so thrilled because of how
she's been conditioned to view marriage. And it's so like,
I feel like the moment you see her happiest is

(59:26):
like I think it's Tanya. They all have very similar
hair colors. Who looks at Muriel in her wedding dress
and says like kind of in horror, like Muriel, you're beautiful,
and she's like glowing at like hearing that from these
women who have bullied her her entire life. And yeah,

(59:47):
it's just like she's looking I mean, that's like Muriel's again,
and it's like, how can you falter for that? I
think all of us have done this to some extent,
and everyone has had someone in their life that has
been a more extreme exam it of like looking for
validation from the people who are cruelest to them instead
of focusing on themselves. And then you're just like you

(01:00:09):
just want to shake her and be like Ronda's right
over there, like when you stop talking to these people
that But that's just I don't know. I just this
movie is so good because you're like this is just
like an abusive cycle that Muriel is caught up in, no,
and like she's seeking out validation and love from people
who just are not capable of it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:30):
Yeah, it reminded me of eighth grade because that's the
journey that the Kayla character goes on throughout the whole movie.
I was also so devastated because in this wedding scene,
the one other character besides Ronda, who seems like she
truly cares for Muriel and her well being. Is Muriel's mom,

(01:00:51):
And she shows up at the wedding and she's late,
but she's there like she had to take a cat
like all that. Like her father was there to like
give her away, and he'll so very cruelly. He's like,
she's yours now, sir, Like.

Speaker 3 (01:01:03):
Well, and it's also like her her father is there
because it makes him look good to be there again.
It's like everything with him is selfish.

Speaker 2 (01:01:11):
It's about image, yeah, yeah, elevating his image. Her mom comes,
she's alone, she's brought this gift that she's clearly intending
to give to Mariel. Mariel completely like breezes past her
and ignores her own mother, and.

Speaker 3 (01:01:26):
She starts crying and she starts crying, Oh my god.

Speaker 2 (01:01:29):
And then things just only get sadder from there with
her mother. But I was just like, oh, like, Mariel,
the people who love you, they are there for you,
and you're like blowing them off, and it's so so sad.
She needs to grow up.

Speaker 3 (01:01:46):
It's really sad. Yeah, And I'm also like she's like
twenty two, like it's but but it. Yeah, the stuff
with her mom again, it's I it's so it felt
very I'm trying to think of a less corny way
to say subversive, but let's just say it. But the
way that the family is introduced at the beginning, at least,

(01:02:08):
like I was not expecting to get so much depth
in those characters, Like I'm so used to seeing like
this is the family that she wants to get away from,
and wouldn't you they suck, you know, And as time
goes on, it's like, I mean, at least the way
that Bill sucks is relentless, but it is so much

(01:02:31):
more complicated and specific than you're you know, led to believe.
And and the ways that her mother is just like ignored,
the dynamic among the siblings, like it's not you know,
like Dostoyevsky, but but there's a lot of depth to
the way that this family processes having to know each other.

(01:02:55):
I agree.

Speaker 2 (01:02:56):
Yeah, it's so many movies of a similar ilk or
that would be sort of like maybe lumped in with
this movie because wedding is in the title, have such
tropy stock characters as far as like I mean, the
leads also, but especially the like, you know, the family,

(01:03:19):
you know, the mom and the dad, or the siblings
or the best friends. And this movie takes time to
show you how all of these characters are. They feel
like real people. They aren't these tropy stock characters. They
have layers, there's layers to them.

Speaker 3 (01:03:41):
It's shreky in it. Sure it's stree, but they're But
but it's also because I mean, and I know the
movie so it's over. But the like, I have complicated
feelings towards the way that the Cruel Friends are portrayed,
because they are sort of made out to be, you know,
like sort of the brain dead bimbo stereotype. Right. But

(01:04:05):
the reason I'm inclined to give this at least some
of a pass is because of the like stock characters
we're talking about, where, you know, the Cruel Friends are
usually the protagonists in these movies, and Muriel is a
side character. Someone with a disability is fully a side

(01:04:27):
character that you don't get any insight into their inner life.
Muriel's family they're like, you wouldn't know a thing about them.
So it's weirdly like the people that you're used to
seeing as protagonists, even like Bryce kind of disappearing when
he seemed to be introduced as like, here's the love interest,
just kidding, like he'll show up onths later. It just

(01:04:50):
feels like, yeah, you're meeting these stock characters and then
seeing them either deepened or written off in a way
that they usually wouldn't be, and it's hard to be
mad at it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:01):
It's interesting. Yeah, so uh, let's see what happens next.
The wedding happens afterward, Ronda confronts Muriel for being a phony,
because Muriel's like, my girlfriends who dumped me, they came
crawling back because I'm famous.

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):
My bullies are literally obsessed with me. I was like,
come on.

Speaker 2 (01:05:27):
Right, And Ronda's like, okay, well that is not impressive
number one number two, I have to move back to
Porpoise spit because you abandoned me. And she says, ooh,
this is my favorite line. She says, maryel van Arkle
is not half the person that Muriel heslop was.

Speaker 3 (01:05:48):
So true, so true. I just yeah, it's it's great.
And then the fact that Ronda is then doomed to
also hang out this bummer group of girls. I'm just like,
oh my god, I was using why she goes along
with that I would sooner be alone. I'm assuming that
it's like it seems like when we see them together later,

(01:06:11):
it seems like Ronda's mom invited them over. I think
they're at Ronda's place. Yeah, because her so I think Ronda,
like Ronda's mom was trying to like force Ronda to
socialize with people she didn't like.

Speaker 2 (01:06:25):
Right because earlier, earlier in the movie, Ronda says, I'd
rather swallow rite of blades than have drinks with the
lux of you.

Speaker 3 (01:06:33):
And you're like, and the way the things end with them,
well we have let's just get to the end of
the movie.

Speaker 2 (01:06:39):
Yeah, okay, So Ronda calls Muriel out back in Porpoise
spit Betty, Mariel's mom accidentally takes some shoes from a
store without paying for them, and the same woman.

Speaker 3 (01:06:52):
Because her feet, her feet her mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (01:06:56):
And she paid for everything else. It just seems like
she forgot to pay for and she has so much
on her mind. Her family hates her and they're cruel
to her.

Speaker 3 (01:07:05):
And it was also like and now that she's been
abandoned by her husband, like she's never been more alone
in taking care of the family, because she was like
asking for basic help from her adult children and husband
when things were quote unquote normal and everyone was saying no.

(01:07:25):
So now it's like her work has been compounded even
worse and everyone is still ignoring her. Who wouldn't shoplift
under these circumstances.

Speaker 2 (01:07:34):
True, but she gets in trouble because the same woman
who got Muriel arrested for stealing the dress. She narks
on Betty.

Speaker 3 (01:07:44):
What a callback wild who thought we would see Diane again?

Speaker 2 (01:07:48):
Wasn't expecting her to make a return. But this is
when Bill tells Betty that he wants a divorce. He's
like leaving her once and for all.

Speaker 3 (01:07:57):
After he does the thing that he does, the fucking
everybody and basically sweet talks Betty out of like having
to serve any time because he's like, oh, I you know,
all cops are my friends, which is like a red flag, right,
But he's super nice to protect ostensibly to protect Betty,

(01:08:17):
but it's just to protect his reputation absolutely, because he
immediately becomes extremely cruel to her this and it's also, oh,
it just made me so I hate him so much.
Like the when they're on the way back and she
was like, I meant to pay for it and like,
I'm so tired, I really just need some help. And

(01:08:38):
then he just turns the radio on and starts ignoring her,
and I'm just like, why won't your head explode?

Speaker 2 (01:08:46):
Like it's tell me about it, nightmare. And then he
tells her he's like divorcing her, and then he says
the reason he wasn't elected to state government when he
ran previously was because his family was such an embarrassment.

Speaker 3 (01:09:01):
I really thought for a second, because at this point,
I'm like, this anything could happen in this movie. I
was sort of hoping that she was gonna like shoot him,
kill him. I sort of thought for a second, I
was like, I wouldn't be mad if she simply shot him.

Speaker 2 (01:09:15):
I would wove for her to do that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But instead she's devastated. She lashes out at her son
for not mowing the lawn. I think, or yeah, he's
right there, and like this is the first moment we
see her kind of breakdown, and then Betty dies A

(01:09:36):
short time later. Maryel is told that it was a
heart attack, but we find out that Betty died by suicide.

Speaker 3 (01:09:45):
And that this and this again just like such a
fucking twist of the knife because we find this out
from a character who Joni, Muriel's sister, who were introduced
to in this very like one liner jokey way, because
every time we heard from Joni, she's like your terrible Mariel,

(01:10:07):
like that's her like catch phrase, and she's like the
younger sister I think, who always is like, haha, you're
in trouble. And that's kind of the only thing we've
known about her other than she rips SIGs hanging out
on the couch. That's what we know about this character.
But then you get like this moment of incredible depth

(01:10:28):
into this character in a way that you just like
aren't expecting. Where Joni found her mother's body, Yeah, was
able to glean that it had been a fatal pill
overdose and that the doctor had covered this up at
the father's request because quote unquote he's been through enough,

(01:10:49):
and so the fact that it was still like this
poor woman's like final cry for help was not going
to be heard because of the person who is abusive
and horrible to her, like it's just uh, and then
the way he acts at the funeral, it's just like
But anyways, that that moment with Joanie is like really perfect.

(01:11:10):
I mean, she's like the it seems like the brothers
are kind of in shock. Weirdly, the youngest daughter seems
like she's inviting her crushes to the funeral question of Mark.
That was weird.

Speaker 2 (01:11:20):
I couldn't I forgot she was one of the siblings
half the time, because I think we don't see her
in some of like the dinner scenes or something, or
she's like focus.

Speaker 3 (01:11:30):
Everyone processes death differently whatever, But like, but just seeing
Jonie in that moment, be like what am I going
to do without her? And realize like, oh, yeah, they
were extremely close and like almost every time you see Joni,
she's with her mom, and and that before the movie's over.
In a way that it is also kind of made

(01:11:50):
me feel sad, was that you could already see sort
of the beginning stages of Jonie beginning to fill the
role that her mother filled in her in her dad's
life of like, you know, then she like hollers down
to him from the balcony and is like, games on,
want me to get you a beer? And it's like
the daughter sort of filling this servile role that the

(01:12:12):
mom filled and to someone who just like couldn't deserve
love less.

Speaker 2 (01:12:21):
It's just got I know this.

Speaker 3 (01:12:22):
This movie is about breaking out of the cycle of abuse.

Speaker 2 (01:12:27):
I know. And then you mentioned so. The funeral is
the next scene, and we see that Bill piece of
shit that he is, is more concerned about how the
press perceive him.

Speaker 3 (01:12:42):
It's clear he like called the press to be like,
you're gonna want to come to my what my wife's funeral?

Speaker 2 (01:12:48):
Wife's funeral? And he doesn't seem to be grieving at all,
or it's just he's so horrible. And this is the
moment that Mauriel realizes not only what a prick her
dad is, but that she is similar to him in
the sense that she cares too much about what other

(01:13:08):
people think of her. She has lied to people and
sabotaged meaningful relationships along the way, and she doesn't want
to be like that anymore. She breaks down her husband,
David Van Arkle.

Speaker 3 (01:13:22):
Who again like this is a a It seems like
another movie is about to start, and then it does
it and you're like, yay, but I was like, oh,
he came what he came to the funeral?

Speaker 2 (01:13:34):
He consults her, this is the first time he's been
any manner of like tender toward her, which feels kind of.

Speaker 3 (01:13:41):
Like a payoff of one of the few interactions we've
seen with them before, another very depressing movie, very depressing
scene in a movie that's full of them. But when
they get back to his like fancy apartment after their
wedding and you know, all the pretenses are dropped and
he's like, all right, there's your room. I'm gonna go swim,

(01:14:04):
and like can kind of feel how meaningful the wedding
was to Muriel and asks her like who the hell
marries someone? Like why would you marry someone who's a stranger?
And she's like, well, you dude just said that and
he's like, well, it's because I want to win, and
she's like so do I, and like they're talking about
totally different things, but you see that that like affects

(01:14:27):
him in some way. But you're like, I don't know
if that's but it clearly it does come back because
whatever thought this you know, fucking goof is capable of having,
at least it was like, oh, I was viewing this
person as a warm body and it turns out that
they're a fucking person, which is a very low bar

(01:14:50):
to clear, but many.

Speaker 2 (01:14:51):
Do not clear it this is true, but yeah, he
consoles her as she's crying. They kiss, and I think
it is implied that they have sex. Yeah, but the
next morning she's like, I'm leaving. We have to break up, goodbye,
And then her dad is like, Muriel, I need you

(01:15:14):
to stay and help me raise the kids. Even though
like how old are these kids? It seems like there's
maybe one under eighteen?

Speaker 3 (01:15:23):
Yeah, I thought so too.

Speaker 2 (01:15:24):
They're like the youngest daughter is she's like a teenager,
a teenager, but yeah, the rest of them seem pretty
close to, if not in fully adulthood.

Speaker 3 (01:15:35):
Yes, we also learn that in the sort of towards
the end of Muriel's mother's life that she burned the
lawn because she was so frustrated that she wasn't able
to get help with it. It just seemed like there was
a lot of struggling that Muriel at very least didn't see,

(01:15:59):
and I think to some extent with the kids without
putting the blak because it is like pretty squarely on
the father, but like a struggle that they weren't comfortable seeing, right.

Speaker 2 (01:16:10):
I think it's probably a combination of her mom was
like good at hiding her various problems, and also that
Muriel and her siblings were wilfully ignoring any signs that
their mother was struggling because they didn't want to be

(01:16:30):
bothered with it, or they were too focused on themselves
or whatever else along those lines.

Speaker 3 (01:16:37):
And I think that there is this I want to
be very careful with the way that I phrase this,
but it's a dynamic that is familiar to me, not
in like my specific family dynamic, but whatever I've seen
it of kids perceiving specifically mothers, usually as weak and

(01:17:00):
as targets of mockery in a lot of cases, and like,
I don't want to be like her kind of thing
without you know, considering how she got there, And yeah,
like that, it just feels like a very specific dynamic
that I haven't really seen a lot in movies. And

(01:17:22):
also that like to some extent that Betty was didn't
want her kids see her struggle because she doesn't want
to worry her kids, and like we see that in
scenes where you know, she's again very willfully ignoring the
fact that Muriel has obviously stolen this money, and it's like,
maybe it was a mistake, maybe it was my fault.

(01:17:43):
I don't know anything's possible. And Muriel's honest, and she
still doesn't want to quite want to hear it. She
doesn't want to quite tell her kids why, like but
only that's another reason where when you get that information
later that Jonie was the one to find that she
died by suicide, and that Jonie seems to be the
only sibling who knows why their dad is gone, it's like, oh,

(01:18:07):
these two characters had it, Like Jonie was her confidant,
because Janie is the one that calls Muriel and it's like, yeah,
Dad like left her. But then when confronted about it,
Betty is like, oh no, don't worry about it. Oh
I've got to go. We're getting raided by the government. Yeah,
you're just like cut o. God, Like, I just hope

(01:18:31):
in her next life, this this fictional character caught a
fucking break, Like it just is so But yeah, I
don't know, like it it's so tragic what happens to her.
But I don't know. I mean, I thought that the
movie showed a lot of care and thought towards her
in a way that I wasn't used to in this genre.

Speaker 2 (01:18:52):
Totally I agree, and I was I mean the moments
that were the most gut right and chinked to me.
We're surrounding the Betty character because she's just so abused
and neglected by her husband, by her children. She's just

(01:19:14):
seems to be kind of waiting on people hand and foot,
and no one is grateful, and no one checks in
with her, and no one cares about how she feels
and life it seems like except for Jonie right right.
And Muriel is again too busy wrapped up in her
own image and getting married to whoever will marry her

(01:19:37):
to notice all the things that's going on with her mother,
and it's just, oh, it's devastating.

Speaker 3 (01:19:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:19:43):
But so there's this moment where her dad, Bill is like,
you have to stay and help me raise the kids,
and Muriel's like, no, I don't, that's actually your job
as a parent. So goodbye, and she leaves. She goes
to Ronda's house, who, like we mentioned before, is hanging
out with Tanya.

Speaker 3 (01:20:02):
She's basically been kidnapped like her I think her mom
is like forcing her to hang out with these assholes.

Speaker 2 (01:20:08):
Yes, And Mariel comes in and she asks Ronda to
move back to Sydney with her, and Ronda, who is
still upset with Muriel, is like whoelm okay, I forgive you.
Let's go, and they get in a cab and the
movie ends with the two of them yelling out the

(01:20:30):
car windows saying like goodbye to the streets and the
malls and the beaches of Porpoise. Spit and so let's
take another quick break and we'll come back to discuss further, and.

Speaker 3 (01:20:56):
We're back will I've already talked about a lot of
elements of the movie in the abstract that was By
the way, kudos on the recap. That was not an
easy recap.

Speaker 2 (01:21:10):
No, it wasn't. I tried to make it as like
concise as possible, but again, just so much happens. There's
so many tonal and narrative shifts throughout this movie that
it was difficult. But I did my best. You did
a wonderful jop, Oh, thank you saving much.

Speaker 3 (01:21:26):
There is one thing I just wanted to add to
the tale end. I guess that could get a conversation
started or not whatever. But with her dad towards the
end of the movie, I think the last scene he
appears in where like you said, like he's like Muriel,
You're gonna have to raise your adult siblings for me,

(01:21:49):
And she's like, no, I don't think so, pretty sure
that you should have been doing that for twenty something
years at this point. Yeah, but that her dad. I
don't even know how to feel about it, because he
is like, it seems like he has a moment of
self awareness that I didn't think he was capable of having.
So I was a little bumped by it. It sort
of felt like it was like trying to knit a

(01:22:11):
bow on it where he it seems like the person
that we've spent time with this whole time would be like, well,
go fuck yourself, goodbye forever, like be cruel. But the Yeah,
so this was a little schmalzy for me, But I
did think it was an interesting choice that he kind
of has this moment of lucidity and is like, you

(01:22:34):
reap what you sew. It is basically admitting like everyone
is leaving me because I have been nothing but selfish
and which again just like really packs a gut punch
for when Jonie calls down to him a character who
he is also abused and lambasted as much as he
has to anyone else in the family and she's like,

(01:22:57):
what can I get for you? And you know, it
just seems like she's mimicking the behavior that she saw
in her mom of you know, like taking care of
people even when they're horrible to you. And I don't know,
I mean again, it's it's a very sad note to
leave things on but his I don't know, she can
we can we talk a little bit more about her mom? Yeah,

(01:23:20):
just because I mean so much of the movie, the
end of it becomes about her mom. Where we were
getting at this in the recap where it's such a
complicated thing because it's it's very clear that like Betty
is so struggling with depression and it seems like she
uses denial as a tool to get through the day basically,

(01:23:42):
and then the reference that she had been taking sleeping
pills for a while, which is also like possibly a
self medication technique, Like you know, that her life was
not easy and she'd been conditioned to believe that no
one was ever going to care about it. But that also,
I mean that it's a tricky and I guess I'll
just like leave it this because I don't know how
to properly have this conversation really but how her being

(01:24:06):
put in this horrible position by her abusive husband also
means that her self medicating and you know, sort of
willfully passively allowing him to continue his reign of terror
has negative effect on her kids. And it's tricky because
I don't want to victim blame her, But in parental

(01:24:28):
situations like that, especially, it's so hard to talk about
because there's like a wounded part of me that's like, well,
isn't she kind of enabling this abuse towards her children
by never calling it out when it's happening right in
front of her, which of course is an offshoot of
her being abused and probably fear of retaliation from her

(01:24:51):
husband and all of these horrible things. But in the
same way, it's I mean, it's just a very sad
situation to see because it's like he, you know, the father,
is laying into any of his kids at any given opportunity,
and she's very often right there and kind of pretends
it doesn't isn't happening, or will say something behind his back,

(01:25:15):
but not to It's just it's just really sad to
take a family that's like so thoroughly abused, especially by
someone as narcissistic as Bill, who will turn on the
charm anytime someone who isn't his family is in the room.

Speaker 2 (01:25:31):
And I think, I mean, it's effective because it's so
emblematic of real dynamics. I think, like we're so used
to watching Hollywood movies that often like sugarcoat these things
or ignore them, or if there is an abusive family dynamic,

(01:25:54):
it's portrayed in this trophy way or like jokey or
cartoonish way or something. And this being like an indie
Australian movie, we were like, oh, this actually resembles authentic
human dynamics. Obviously not all of them, but like, this

(01:26:15):
is this is a familiar dynamic that I've observed in
other people. I mean, there are It's not a one
for one, but I've I kind of saw a little
bit of my family in.

Speaker 3 (01:26:30):
Sure Likewise, likewise.

Speaker 2 (01:26:32):
Where like my dad is a narcissist, he was not
outwardly cruel to my siblings and I, but he was
certainly like emotionally negligent. And then like my mom would
try to challenge it sometimes, but usually it was easier
for her to just kind of like power through and

(01:26:55):
do the best buy her kids as she could. And
I feel like we weren't always as great well as
we should have been for our mom's attempts at keeping
things stable in the household, and we didn't do a
great job of considering how she might be feeling and
stuff like that. Yeah, so I was like, oh, this,
there's some familiar stuff. I've experienced variations of this in

(01:27:17):
my own life.

Speaker 3 (01:27:18):
Yeah. Yeah, it reminds me a lot of an aunt
and uncle that like, yeah, I spent a lot of
time where it's just and how it is portrayed as like,
you know, on a long enough timeline, this is just
normal for them, Like, oh, yeah, this is just how,
And I think it is. The movie doesn't bash you

(01:27:38):
over the head with it, but that Muriel is just
any time she's nearer her father until the very end
when he realizes that, you know, he has no more
power to exert over her. She's not going to go
back because she's concerned about her mom. Because her mom
isn't there, she is no longer financially obligated, Like she's

(01:27:59):
extracted herself from this cycle of abuse that her family's
caught in. I think it's sad and realistic that the
whole family is not liberated from it, at least not
right away. But anyways, towards the beginning where he calls
her lazy, he points out, like I spent all this
money on her and she can't even type, and she's like, yes,
I can, and he's like, no, you can't. He body

(01:28:21):
shames her, like, and it seems like her response to
that is just like she's tremendously depressed the second she
leaves her life. I mean, it's a mess because she's
like twenty one or whatever, but like, but she immediately
gets a job, Like she immediately is able to do all,
like live independently in the way that her dad would

(01:28:41):
tell her every day she couldn't possibly do. And it's
like right, because being away from that energy and that
horribleness is what would allow you to just be a person.
And it's just I feel like the storytelling does that
so effortlessly, where it literally is like cut to her
having a job that she likes, because you could do

(01:29:03):
that in the nineties, I think. But I just thought
it was like, really, yeah, the dad is the source
of terror is just.

Speaker 2 (01:29:12):
Like so clear, right, And it also informs probably why
she puts up with the abuse from Tanya and all
of those women who are so cruel to her, because
when you've become accustomed to abuse, then you going back
to my family, like my mom was raised by a

(01:29:35):
very abusive mother, and she has said to me many
many times, like that's why I married your dad, who
was like not good to me. But that's what I knew,
Like that I tolerated it because that's really all I understood.
So you have the sense that Maryel hangs out with

(01:29:56):
these women who are outwardly cruel to her be because
she has just become accustomed to this abuse from her father,
and then she starts to I mean, it takes her
a little while to liberate herself from it. But this
friendship with Rhonda is, like you said, like the catalyst

(01:30:16):
that gets her on a path of liberation. And that's
like the core, what like the core of the movie
as far as like I read it, it is like, yeah,
you know, as far as like Muriel's arc, I wanted
to get into that a little bit because yeah, again,
Muriel starts out as this person who's lying to people,

(01:30:42):
she's stealing dresses, she's trying to fit in with this
crowd who doesn't want her. She ends up marrying a
guy who seems repulsed by her, just so she can
say she's gotten married. She's like basically living a false life. Meanwhile,
throughout this she has made one actual friend in Ronda.

(01:31:04):
She's the one person in Mariel's life aside from her mom,
who accepts Mariel for who she is. Ronda doesn't tolerate
Maryel being like dishonest and phony, and we see her
call Maryel out for that, But when she's being an honest,
genuine person, Ronda loves Mariel for who she is. But

(01:31:26):
when you know Ronda needs her the most, Mariel abandons
her in favor of this wedding and all the attention
she's getting, Yeah, because she's finally living out this fantasy.
And then Mariel's arc culminates partly because she sees how
horrible her father is being at her mother's funeral. She

(01:31:47):
realizes that she's living this sham life that she's been,
you know, as disingenuous as her shitty father. And then
she leaves it all behind to reunite with which is
like a very interesting story and not one that you
generally see because one it shows a woman who's a

(01:32:09):
mess in a way that again just feels authentic to
real life.

Speaker 3 (01:32:14):
Yeah, it's not misogynists. It's just like you are given
all the information that you need to understand, however misguided
and occasionally very selfish. What Muriel is doing is you
understand where it's coming from, and like you're rooting for
her to do better, and I get It's like, I
kind of love how the movie teases you with a

(01:32:36):
potentially really shitty ending right at the end where like
she opens the church door and her fake husband's there
and he maybe likes her now, but and I think again,
like a lesser movie would be like, oh, they're gonna
fall in love. But then she but it's like the
strongest she ever is that she's like I don't love

(01:32:58):
you like I Yeah, it's and you're just like woo.
And he's like I don't love you either, but you
could live with me, and she's like no.

Speaker 2 (01:33:09):
And serves more than that.

Speaker 3 (01:33:11):
I really love that moment. Yeah, that like she's able
to see I don't know. I mean, God, may everyone
be so lucky to realize in their early twenties that
they're repeating the mistakes of their parents, and I was like, yeah,
that's in some ways it is a fantasy film, but I'm.

Speaker 2 (01:33:32):
Sure some people have managed to do it.

Speaker 3 (01:33:35):
Yeah, but I mean, yeah, her friendship with Ronda is
so life changing and so like life affirming and yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:33:41):
Yeah right, because like we see Maryel being a mess
for the bulk of the movie, but it's very different
from that like rom com version, like Hollywood rom conversion
of a woman who's a mess quote unquote, because that
always feels very cart tony and trophy, and it's like

(01:34:01):
she's a mess because she's single and she works too
much at her magazine job and that's why she's single,
and she just needs a boyfriend to cure her messiness.
And we don't get any of that with the Murial character.
And that's another thing that's so interesting about this movie
because so many movies from this era that central woman

(01:34:24):
as a protagonist are about her finding hetero love and
that being the thing that fulfills her. But this movie
is about her personal growth and her solid friendship or
like perhaps because of a solid friendship with another woman
who supports her and cares for her.

Speaker 3 (01:34:44):
And I love that.

Speaker 2 (01:34:46):
It's a great.

Speaker 3 (01:34:46):
Movie exactly exactly I mean, and also that I mean
all of us fakes. Like the title, the title is
basically a joke where you know, she becomes I mean,
she becomes disabused of all of these things because is
basically a coming of age movie of everything that she's
told is going to like make her the right kind
of person, which at the beginning of the movie she

(01:35:08):
so badly wants to be, to the point that she's
being very or she's been conditioned. I don't want to
put it all on her, but like she's being very
self destructive in pursuit of being anybody but herself, and
marriage is the ultimate way to become a different person
in the way that she's been socially conditioned, which still

(01:35:29):
happens right, And it's like she's at her saddest when
she's trying on wedding dresses, she's at her least authentic
when she's getting married, and at her kind of cruelest
to the people in her life. She blows off her mom,
she ignores Rhonda like and then does this sort of

(01:35:49):
really condescending like, oh no, I don't want you to
hang out with us, I got you a plane ticket,
and then she's like fuck you Like, so she's at
her the sort of like she's at her worst and
she's living out her fantasy. Yeah, and I you know,
it's it's a little broad, but it also it just
like it works so well in the story of like,
you know, maybe Muriel will get married someday, but not

(01:36:12):
for the reasons that she did the first time, because
it seems like she, you know, like really is at
least well on her way to understanding that that is.
And I think unfortunately, through a lot of tragedy and
seeing how tremendously depressed her mother was until the end
of her life and just knowing that, like she had

(01:36:33):
to move forward another way to do right by herself
and honestly, I think, to some extent do right by
her mom's memory too. I think that it is like
I feel like where they attribute to her mom to
you know, liberate herself from this dynamic that her mom

(01:36:53):
was trapped in. And then Rhonda, I just love this
broad She's so great. But let let's talk let's talk
about rod. I mean she I don't know, it is
really I love seeing friends become friends really fast in
a convincing way. I love just all of it. And

(01:37:13):
they're like, Yep, we're gonna move in together. We're best
friends now, blah blah blah. She's really horny. She's having
three ways with sailor American sailors. Whatever. But let's talk
about Yeah, this is a character who is able bodies
at the beginning of the movie and is disabled at

(01:37:34):
the end of the movie. She's using a wheelchair permanently, which, yeah,
let's let's talk about it.

Speaker 2 (01:37:42):
I mean, this one's a little trickier than our than
most of our conversations surrounding disability, because it's often a
character who from the moment we see them on screen
till the end of the movie, they are disabled the
entire span.

Speaker 3 (01:38:01):
Mccaulluff Time, macaulay Culkin.

Speaker 2 (01:38:03):
And Saved right is my go to example. Yeah, right,
played by an able bodied actor, which is often the case,
which is what warrants the criticism. In this case, it's
a little trickier because she is able bodied for i'd say,
like the first half of the time we see her

(01:38:26):
on screen, so it makes the casting trickier. I'm inclined
to give this a little bit of a pass, or
at least some leeway because of the circumstances of her
being an able bodied character for part of it. But
it's tricky.

Speaker 3 (01:38:47):
It's tricky. I am inclined to agree with you. I
would also like, I would love to hear what our
disabled listeners feel about this character, because obviously weird like
not the be all and opinion of this. Of course,
I don't feel qualified to make the call, but I
think as as far as how Ronda is written, I

(01:39:07):
was like, particularly for nineteen ninety four, pretty impressed with Again,
it seems to push back on some popular tropes around disability,
where you know, at the beginning, when I mean just
the medical frustration that we've both experienced versions of of,
you know, being talked to either like you're a baby

(01:39:29):
or a scientist by a doctor and nothing in between.
And you know, and and Ronda again, because she's just
a very blunt person. You know, Muriel's like, what is
he saying? She's like, he's saying, I'm like fucked but
he can't say that, you know, and seeing her frustrations,
and you know, Muriel's saying something that is coming from

(01:39:50):
a good place, but it's something we hear a lot
around disability of like no, Ronda you're going to walk,
You're going to walk again, which is her encouraging Ronda
and doesn't want her to lose hope, which is totally fair,
but I think also buys into this idea that an
able bodied life is the only one worth having or

(01:40:11):
the only one to strive towards, even though it's not
you know addressed explicitly you Know Ronda as time when
we flash forward, like, Ronda is understandably tremendously frustrated and
sad when she loses the use of her legs and
struggles with it, but it seems like she's ultimately more

(01:40:32):
frustrated that she has to move home than anything else.
And by the time we see Ronda at Maryelle's wedding,
she seems like comfortable in her wheel. It's just how
other people talk to her and treat her that's the problem.
Where it seems like, when she gets past the initial
shock and adjustment of living with a disability, that it's

(01:40:57):
mainly other people who are the problem. We see it
in a so much casual ableism that is explicit in
the movie. It's like played for laughs to make the
person doing it look bad because it's the ladies in
the dress shop where oh my god, what was the
and like Ronda's like, get the fuck out of my way,

(01:41:19):
where she said you just can't come in here and
threaten brides, I don't care how unfortunate you are, and
Ronda says fuck you, which is the only response to
that sentence. There's a moment with Ronda's mother where Ronda's like,
I don't want to sit in the front of the
wedding because she doesn't really want to be there is
the reason. But you know, Ronda's mom is very casually like, well, good,

(01:41:41):
you won't be in anyone's way. And then I think
the most over the top example is the evil Friends
talking to her like she has died and her being like,
I'm not ditch Cheryl.

Speaker 2 (01:41:55):
You're like right, because one of them says something like
you were so full of life and it's like I
still what am here?

Speaker 3 (01:42:01):
Right?

Speaker 2 (01:42:01):
Just because I'm disabled now doesn't change that.

Speaker 3 (01:42:05):
Yeah, And she's also just she's also telling them that
she's beat cancer, which is like amazing, Like but yeah.
We see her encounter a lot of like quiet and
loud ableism throughout the movie, and it's always pushed back
on and again it's just like, I'm sure that it

(01:42:27):
is not a perfect depiction by any means, but I
appreciated that it was even acknowledged, because I feel like
so many movies just perpetuate ableism and don't acknowledge that,
like this is a problem that able bodied people don't
know how to talk to anybody who isn't like them.

Speaker 2 (01:42:48):
Like totally. Yeah, I think for like a movie from
the mid nineties, it does surprisingly well in that regard.
This is a topic which we can, you know, move
on to or address later. But I was kind of
reminded the same way that you know, characters are hurling

(01:43:09):
ablest macro or micro aggressions at Rhonda. There are examples
of white characters committing racist aggressions in a way that
the movie tends to seem to present it as like,
look at this foolish person saying this foolish thing. But

(01:43:31):
at the same time, the movie has a cast of
almost exclusively white people and certainly only gives interiority to
the white characters, right, so it kind of undermines the
spotlight on oh, look how foolish this racist person is.
But yeah, there's like there's yeah, I don't want to

(01:43:52):
get too specific, because some of them are really gross, but.

Speaker 3 (01:43:55):
It's mostly anti Asian racism. Yeah, I was noticing a
lot of anti a racism and also anti Indigenous racism.

Speaker 2 (01:44:03):
Yeah right, because there's there's a reference to Bill doing
a real estate development project on land that Aboriginal people
had been living on and those Indigenous people were displaced
so that a resort or something could be built, and
then Bill is talking about this and like carrying on
as though I deserve recognition for the great work I

(01:44:25):
did to build this you know, development, and it's just
like completely dismissing the you know, the violence and displacement
toward the Aboriginal people who we don't see on screen
or never meet any Aboriginal people in this movie. So
it's we do.

Speaker 3 (01:44:43):
Meet Aboriginal people in the other movie that stars that
actor that came out that year.

Speaker 2 (01:44:49):
But yes, which we discussed and you can go back, and.

Speaker 3 (01:44:53):
Also has its own problems. Yeah, but yeah, no, I
felt like, you know, the reason for me, and again
it's not for me to make this call, but part
of the reason that I didn't find the movie to
be tremendously ablest is because we have a disabled character
who we love and who pushes back against the ableism

(01:45:18):
and like loves and accepts herself. It's the circumstance she's
frustrated with right, but with the it seems like they're
trying to go for a similar thing. But it's like,
if your cast is all white excepting very passing, you know, interactions,
then those jokes are not gonna land, at least for us,

(01:45:39):
not particularly well, because there's no one there to push
back on it. So it's just like, haha, they are racist,
which is not a particularly effective joke.

Speaker 2 (01:45:50):
Yeah, I agree.

Speaker 3 (01:45:52):
It's like yeah, it's like, you know, you can say, well,
we hate those characters and this is just another reason
to hate them, but it's like, well, we already hated them. Again.
It's like, if you want to go there, if that's
the route you want to go, don't only cast white
people because it's like it's the racism in the room
with us kind of vibe.

Speaker 2 (01:46:10):
Yeah for sure, not.

Speaker 3 (01:46:11):
To say that. I mean, you know, I'm not accusing
the director of being racist. I'm just like, you need
representation of more than white people obviously, but also like
those jokes aren't going to land in an all white cast,
and it's like silly to expect them.

Speaker 2 (01:46:30):
To, right to the point where you're not even sure
what the intent was with those jokes. It's like, is
it to call out the white people for being racist?
Or are we supposed to be laughing along with the joke?
Because the movie doesn't make that super super clear.

Speaker 3 (01:46:46):
In nineteen ninety four, I don't know what the answer is.
Anyone's guessed, right, So yeah, no, I totally agree with you,
And it's that's unfortunate because I think that, like by
writing Rhonda's Care so thoughtfully, that this movie is able
to push back on a lot of ablest tropes, So

(01:47:07):
it's unfortunate that it sort of just plays into lazier
tropes around racism.

Speaker 2 (01:47:15):
Also wanted to talk about the body shaming and fat
shaming that particularly Muriel's character is subjected to different family
members and friends of hers or former friends fat shame her.
But then you also learn that Tony collect gained weight

(01:47:38):
for the role, and not that I don't want Tony
Collette to get roles, especially starmaking roles like this, but
productions throughout history have had a bad habit of not
casting fat actors or just actors of varying body sizes.
And instead either casting an actor and then requiring that

(01:48:03):
they gain weight or putting them in a fat suit.

Speaker 3 (01:48:06):
Which also feels I mean what I mean, We unfortunately
don't need to go back very far in movie history
because this still very much happens. It was a lot
of the discourse surrounding the Whale, which one Brendan Fraser
a fucking oscar. It's I don't know, I mean, like
we've had this conversation on the show before, but I
was disappointed to learn that. Not shocked given the nineteen

(01:48:31):
ninety four of it, all right, but certainly disappointed because
it's just like Tony Klette is tremendously talented, so are
actors that aren't rail Thinn. You know, like, if this
is canon to this character who we love, cast accordingly,

(01:48:51):
you know, it's.

Speaker 2 (01:48:52):
Right, there are available actors of all sizes, and if
the role requires an actor to be a certain size,
there's already an actor who's that exact size that could
have been cast without requiring that they make any changes
to their body.

Speaker 3 (01:49:12):
Absolutely, And it's it's so wild because it's just like,
but although I guess you couldn't make a movie in
nineteen ninety four in Australia without this guy Bill, so
Bill to be there's only like sometimes when you see
Australian movies, I'm like, are there ten working actors in
this country? Like what is going on? Bill is in

(01:49:35):
all of them? That's so wild?

Speaker 2 (01:49:38):
Yeah it's it's I mean, and good good.

Speaker 3 (01:49:40):
For him, but yeah no. But I'm glad that you
pointed that out because I was also like, I need
to do more research, and then the research made me
sad many such cases. Let me see. That's like, I
think most.

Speaker 2 (01:50:00):
Of what I had I didn't have much else. We
covered a lot of stuff during the recap. I think
the last thing that I wanted to just include was
a quote from a piece from The Guardian by an
Australian writer named Karen Pickering, who wrote kind of like
a retrospective review in twenty seventeen about this movie entitled

(01:50:22):
Mauriel's Wedding is a feminist masterpiece and more relevant than ever.
She doesn't go quite as like intersectional as our discussion
has been, but she does point out a lot of
the positives which I tended to agree with. So I'll
just share a few quick paragraphs from this quote. Lots

(01:50:43):
of little moments resonate with me as a feminist observer.
Rhnda is totally and unapologetically sex positive, and when her
casual sex partners think a guy is taking advantage of Maryel,
they intervene on her. Behalf. Bryce is an example of gentle, respectful,
and war masculinity, which you could maybe because of how

(01:51:03):
strong he comes on you could maybe disagree with that,
but anyway, Yeah, well, David is positively influenced in this
direction by Mauriel. Also maybe up for debate. Undoubtedly, patriarchy
is the decisive factor in creating Muriel's reprehensible dad, in
the behavior of her hapless siblings, in the power differential
between her mother and father, and even in the despicable

(01:51:26):
deirdrech Chambers just a sad woman in a bad man's world.

Speaker 3 (01:51:31):
I guess that we didn't really talk about Deirdre, but
I don't have that much to say other than it
seems like she is coded as like, here's a woman
who will step on anyone to achieve some notoriety or comfort,
such as you know, participating in MLMs. And I mean also,

(01:51:51):
oh oh, I wanted to bring this up in the
conversation about Muriel's mother about Betty what Deirdre says about
her towards the end of the movie where you know,
Deirdre says again, just because Betty, even from beyond the grave,
is being punished by her piece of shit ex husband
says like, oh, you know, this is gonna make Bill

(01:52:13):
look a lot more sympathetic in the press, so at
least her life had a purpose. And I was like,
you fucking it, Like I just oh, I like my
blood was. I don't know how someone said that about
my mom and our relationships up and down, but like
I would hit somewhat. That's like, oh my god, how

(01:52:37):
did Deirdre not take one to the fucking nose on that?

Speaker 2 (01:52:40):
That was like, uh, I don't but.

Speaker 3 (01:52:45):
I respect what the what the writer's saying, and it's
true and it is I'm sure it's like canonically true,
but I'm like, I know, I hate that bitch. I
hate that bitch.

Speaker 2 (01:52:53):
Yeah, no, she's awful. Just to finish out this quote,
the writer goes on to say Bill has exemplifies a
particularly Australian strain of toxic masculinity. He's matro corrupt, racist,
cruel to his children, and wholly abusive to his poor wife.
The most likable he ever gets is when he's grudgingly
impressed by Muriel giving him the what for before she leaves.

(01:53:18):
I don't know if that's an Australian expression, but I
don't know what the what for?

Speaker 3 (01:53:21):
The what for? I think it's just like standing up
to him kind of.

Speaker 2 (01:53:25):
That makes sense finally, And how can we understand her beautiful,
tragic mom without factoring in the misogyny and sexism that's
kept her in this home full of people who treat
her so badly. Yeah, but in Mariel's case, it's also
a patriarchal fantasy that keeps her alive, the dream that
one day she'll be a success because someone will want

(01:53:47):
to marry her unquote. And yeah, I think that's the
last thing I wanted to just touch a little bit
more on as far as this idea of And Mauriel's
not alone in this. I've met people throughout my life
were who cared more about getting married than who they married,

(01:54:09):
or like everything was focused on the wedding. The wedding's
the happiest day of your life, and it's like, will
what about the relationship after that?

Speaker 3 (01:54:19):
Or like, but what I really appreciate about this movie
is that I think that a lot of even like
movies that are ostensibly feminist, and not to say that
this doesn't happen, because sure it does. Some people are
simply vapid, right, Like it happens across the gender spectrum.

(01:54:40):
But I think that sometimes when particularly a woman is
perceiving marriage this way, movies that sort of taut themselves
and pat themselves on the back for their own feminism
are like, look at this fucking loser who's not like
cool and feminist, like the main character who has never

(01:55:00):
made a mistake in response to patriarchy. Like it's like,
what makes me really appreciate Muriel even more is that,
like she's drank the kool aid, and a lot of
people drink the kool aid, and some people even get
drink the kool aid and get married and then realize fuck.
I mean, it's it's really hard to you know, against

(01:55:23):
a culture that is still this adamant about merit for sure,
and then also I mean whatever, there's We've talked about
marriage plenty on the show. But I just really appreciated
and it felt rare that, you know, I think when
we see movies that surround women and weddings. Very often
it's just like she's getting married. It's like done with

(01:55:44):
the assumption. That's like, and of course we know this
is the most important day of her life, and blah blah,
blah blah. It's just like assuming that you have drank
the kool aid. And then there's movies that I think
are like corny bad twenty tens feminism, that are like
any woman who wants to get married is an agent
of the patriarchy, where it's like the truth is always

(01:56:06):
going to be somewhere in the middle there. And with Muriel,
it's like she's being disabused of this really patriarchal structure
that is all she knows. And it's not until she
escapes and lives a little bit and connects with someone
on a deeper level through Ronda, that she's able to realize,
like and you know, until she literally gets what she wants.

(01:56:28):
And it's horrible that she's like, well, I'm gonna get
out while i can, and you know, and maybe she
will find love down the line, we'll get married, maybe
she won't. But it's just like it's cool to see
someone be disabused of that and still have the movie
be like wholy on their side, because it's a journey
a lot of people have.

Speaker 2 (01:56:48):
To go on, definitely, And yeah, I don't I don't
blame people for having been conditioned to like disproportionately value
getting married or just like the idea of getting married
or the idea of having a wedding, because there's an entire,
you know, bazillion dollar industry built around that, there's and

(01:57:11):
not for nothing, we love going to weddings and as
to your wedding, but yeah, I mean so much of
patriarchy does condition people, and especially women to strongly value
the idea of getting married and not even like not
like having a marriage and having a meaningful relationship with

(01:57:33):
with a companion. It's just like you gotta get married.
The subtext, according to the patriarchy is like become.

Speaker 3 (01:57:42):
A man's property, right, But it's like and then and
then the whole you know lie the eresults in these
like compet structure is that as a woman, you will
become a more the most complete version of yourself exactly
when you get married to a man. And so I

(01:58:03):
think with every with every feminist movement, that the conception
of marriage has been sort of adjusted or like altered
by the right to make this very conservative notion Syne.
And I mean, I'm fucking getting married next year, Like
you have a fiance. I have a fiance, but it's

(01:58:23):
because I simply really want to marry, like I'm excited
about it, which is like, then do it. But yeah,
I feel like people the way that people sell, particularly
young women on marriage by praying on their self esteem
is and during like second wave feminism of like, no,
actually being married is a way to be self actualized.

(01:58:47):
You're like, shut the fuck up, dude, Like there, you know,
it's just interesting watching the news scams that people come
up with. But you know, Muriel sees through the matrix
at the end of the movie and realizes that friendship
is the true wedding or something.

Speaker 2 (01:59:07):
No, if that's exactly it, And that's why I really
appreciate this movie again, Like, yes, she she has more
maturing to do. She you know, needs to learn how
to be a more honest person. But it's this caring,
supportive friendship with her friend Rhonda. I keep wanting to

(01:59:31):
call her Rodna. I don't even think that's a name.
That's a cool name, Rodna, It's Ronda I'm just having
a bit of a brain thing today. But Ronda is, Yeah,
the thing that she that Muriel needed to see the light.

(01:59:53):
I love it.

Speaker 3 (01:59:54):
Yeah, and just seeing especially with I guess the last
thing I'll say about Rhonda and Uriel is that, you know, Ronda,
part of what draws them to each other is they
really admire each other and you know, and that even
after Muriel kind of exposes herself as like I've been

(02:00:14):
lying to you, Ronda's upset about it, she's hurt, but
it doesn't make her think Muriel isn't awesome. Yeah, and
that is like a true friend of like you know,
and and not everyone would would do that, and maybe
they would be right to write like that's a pretty
big lie. But she's like, okay, fine, so Tim Sims

(02:00:36):
wasn't real, You're still cool, like.

Speaker 2 (02:00:38):
Because in that moment, Maryel explains why she made Tim
Simms up. She's like, exactly, I hate myself and if
I was marrying someone, I could be a different person
and I would love a different person, which like might
and probably wouldn't even be true.

Speaker 3 (02:00:54):
Like no, I mean, well we learned that's not true
because she marries some guy and this miserable.

Speaker 2 (02:01:00):
Right, so the way that she actually will love herself
has nothing to do with marriage or being with a
man or anything like that. She lays all this out
and Ronda she hears that. She sees that, and she's like,
this is still a person worthy of my friendship and
like probably needs my help. They need each other, They

(02:01:23):
need each other for sure.

Speaker 3 (02:01:26):
I love them. I love them. This movie passes the
Bechdel test obviously a lot.

Speaker 2 (02:01:31):
Yes, lots of different combinations of characters talking about all
kinds of stuff. There are discussions about men. Some of
them are made up. Oh does it pass the test
if you're talking about Tim Simms, who's not a real.

Speaker 3 (02:01:43):
Person feminist icon timsons. We don't know how Tim Simms identifies.
We don't because Tim Sims is made up.

Speaker 2 (02:01:51):
Well, Tim Sims is a cop, so he's.

Speaker 3 (02:01:54):
See him, Tim Simms. I hate to hear it anyways, Okay, Yeah,
it passes a lot, And honestly, most of the interactions
about men are pretty anti men. It's yeah, I don't
think this movie has a very high opinion of men.

(02:02:14):
And that's why I and that's why I trust it.

Speaker 2 (02:02:17):
Wow, Titanic, I don't.

Speaker 3 (02:02:19):
Think if we've ever thrown that line in before, so
for your consideration, it doesn't make any sense. That's why
I trusted.

Speaker 2 (02:02:27):
Did you catch my Summer Heights High reference from like
two hours ago?

Speaker 3 (02:02:30):
Oh my god, the.

Speaker 2 (02:02:33):
Curly haired beach yeah, may yeah, oh yeah, that's probably No,
that's a jama and that's not Summer High High briber raids.

Speaker 3 (02:02:41):
I mix it up. Yeah, Jame meant a lot to me.

Speaker 2 (02:02:45):
Well, I mean, same spelling, different pronunciation.

Speaker 3 (02:02:49):
I think, so, just like there's an accent mark, I think.
But yeah, yeah, so it passes the vectels test handily. Yeah,
so but what about the one perfect metric, the nipple scale?

Speaker 2 (02:03:02):
Oh, you mean our scale where we rate the movie
on a scale of zero to five nipples based on
looking at the movie through an intersectional feminist lens.

Speaker 3 (02:03:14):
Why, yes, I do.

Speaker 2 (02:03:15):
Well in that case, I'll give this. I'm like between
I want to see like a three and a half,
maybe edging toward a four. There's a lot that I
think this movie handles well. There's a few things that
I'm a little dicey on that I think are very

(02:03:40):
you know, criticism about how the movie handles like the
racist microaggressions that different characters hurl head people, and the
discussion around ableism and the discussion around body and body size,
those are a little iffier. But because this movie at

(02:04:02):
its core is about two women forming a friendship that
is just like sweet, and it's not the healthiest friendship
on account of Maurial lying a lot, but she learns
not to do that, but she's working on and that's
the thing too, Like there's so few movies about a
messy woman who's messy in a way that actually feels

(02:04:24):
like real life and that needs to learn and not
be dishonest, not be lying to people, et cetera, because
movies and society ever heard of it, well, except expect
women to be these perfect little angels who are not
allowed to misbehave in any way and who have to

(02:04:46):
just be born perfect. And we have very little tolerance
for messy women. And I love to see a movie
about a messy woman, But I also love to see
a movie about a messy woman growing, because messy people should,
you know, grow and learn, right, And that's what this
movie is all about. So I really appreciate it. And
I'll land on like three point seventy five nipples and

(02:05:09):
I'll distribute them between Tony Collette, the actor who plays Ronda,
Rachel Griffiths, and Tim Sims imaginary imaginary King.

Speaker 3 (02:05:26):
Yeah, I'm gonna go three point seven five as well.
I agree, particularly with regards to the racism and asking
a I mean not Tony Kollett was not famous at
this time, but having an actor gain weight instead of simply.

Speaker 2 (02:05:39):
Just casting an actor who's already the size of the character.

Speaker 3 (02:05:42):
Yeah, basically everything else about this movie I was really
pleasantly surprised by. Like I was really blown away. It's like,
it's a really funny, memorable movie about the cycle of
trauma in families. And I still laughed so much and
you could never predict what's going to happen next in

(02:06:04):
this movie. I love Love Love just a story about yeah,
like being liberated through friendship but still being a messy
twenty one, twenty two year old, Like it just yeah,
she feels so real and the performances are amazing, and
I just feel like it's like this weird, awesome commentary

(02:06:24):
on it's the exact opposite of what the poster leads
you to believe, right, it's going to be And I
really love that I got gotten big time. This movie
got our asses because even the like, I mean, I'm
sort of wondering if they were trying to market it
as like, because this is kind of a hard sell
to your average rom com goer, to be like, it's

(02:06:46):
the most depressing thing you'll ever see. Prepare to not
feel escape from reality at all, because the poster says,
a comedy about a small town girl who didn't fit in,
but it's about to learn how to stand out. Uriel's wedding,
she's not just getting married, she's getting even I'm like,
that doesn't feel like the movie. I feel like they

(02:07:06):
were just trying to be like, it's a movie about
a wedding, go see it, just trick people into going
because it is a tricky sell. But I think it's awesome. Yes,
I'm gonna do three point seventy five nipples. I'm gonna
give them to Toni Collette. I'm gonna give one to
Jocelyn Moore and Linda House, who were Yeah, the two
producers of this movie were women. I'm gonna give one
to editor Jill Billcock, who also who's just an Australian legend,

(02:07:32):
also edited Strictly Ballroom Romeo Plus Juliet and Mulin Rouge
and Oh my God, Kate Blanchette, another Australian legend. She
also edited the Cate Blanchette Queen Elizabeth's movie Oh from
the nineties. So I'll give one to her and then
i'll give by last point five. Yeah, you know what,

(02:07:52):
I'm gonna give it to Tim Simms as well, because
he had me in the first act. Then it turns
out he was a vengeful cop.

Speaker 2 (02:07:59):
Oh okay, wait, I take back my Tim Sims nipple
and I'm gonna yeah, sorry, I forgot that he's a cop.

Speaker 3 (02:08:06):
Well I won't.

Speaker 2 (02:08:08):
I'm gonna give he's not real.

Speaker 3 (02:08:11):
But I do, like, I don't want Tim Sims to
get any bright ideas.

Speaker 2 (02:08:14):
I do want to distribute some of my nipples to
Muriel's mom and her sister Jonie.

Speaker 3 (02:08:22):
I yes, Betty and Jonie, I really And meanwhile, I'm
the person that just screamed they're not real. I am
so like. I just hope that Muriel calls Joni regularly.
I was worried for Joanie at the end. I don't
want Joni to get stuck in that pattern of abuse
with her dad because it's not like he's going to

(02:08:42):
ever improve. I'm like, Jony, I'm assuming you're an adult. Like,
it's hard to tell how old people were in the
nineties because they weren't using SPS sunblock and they were
ripping STIGs. But like, my heart really went out to Joni.

Speaker 2 (02:09:00):
Yeah, I hope she moves on.

Speaker 3 (02:09:01):
I'm still keeping my nipples with timsim. That is fine.
I allow it.

Speaker 2 (02:09:06):
And with that, listeners, thank you so much for those
of you who have been frothing at the mouth for
this Mariel's wedding episode. I know it's it's some of
you at least. I hope you enjoyed it.

Speaker 3 (02:09:20):
We really enjoyed putting it together. Yeah, we hope it
was worth the way because this was a blast.

Speaker 2 (02:09:25):
Yeah, it was a prospect on our wedding Webuary month
last year. Yup, and it didn't quite make the cut.
But here it is on the main feed, So yeah,
what now?

Speaker 3 (02:09:37):
What now?

Speaker 2 (02:09:38):
But speaking of the main feed versus our Matreon, it's
something you should subscribe to. You can go to patreon
dot com slash spectal Cast. It's five dollars a month.
You get two bonus episodes on amazing themes such as
wedding Webruary. What a bargain and plus you get access

(02:10:00):
to the entire back catalog. So check that out. Check
out our link tree, our letterbox. You know, give us
five nipples on your listening platform, all that good stuff, follow.

Speaker 3 (02:10:13):
Us on Instagram, and most of all, follow your heart.
And with that, listeners, let's get in the car and always.

Speaker 2 (02:10:22):
Say it we Bye bye Street, Bye shopping Mall, I Cry,
Bye surfer Boys, Bye Los Angeles, Goodbye Porpoise Spit. What
a just I'd live there, No, I wouldn't, No horrible play.
Goodbye Porpoise Spit, Bye Bye. The Bechdel Cast is a

(02:10:47):
production of iHeartMedia, hosted by Caitlin Derante and Jamie Loftus,
produced by Sophie Lichterman, edited by Mola Board. Our theme
song was composed by Mike Kaplan with vocals by Catherine Voskresenski.
Our logo in merch is designed by Jamie Loftus and
a special thanks to Aristotle Acevedo. For more information about

(02:11:07):
the podcast, please visit linktree, slash Bechdelcast

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