0:01

On the Bechde Cast, the questions ask

0:03

if movies have women and them,

0:05

are all their discussions just boyfriends and

0:07

husbands or do they have individualism?

0:10

It's the patriarchy, Zephyn bast

0:12

start changing with the Bechdel Cast.

0:16

Hello, Bechdel Cast listeners.

0:18

My name is Caitlin and my name is

0:20

Jamie, and this is the Bechdel Cast. You know what

0:22

you love it? If this is your first time catch

0:24

up, maybe because it's

0:26

an unusual week, been an unusual months

0:29

on the cast, and I celebrate that. This

0:32

week we are releasing a

0:34

live show, and not just any live show, a

0:36

live show we just recorded in Los

0:38

Angeles as of this recording less than

0:40

twenty four hours ago.

0:42

Yes, and speaking

0:44

of live shows, so

0:47

we'll get in. We'll get to the episode in

0:49

just a moment, but before we do, we

0:51

want to take this opportunity to

0:53

let you know about more

0:56

live shows that we are going to be doing,

0:58

because we have a tour planned for February

1:00

twenty twenty four. We are

1:03

going to the Bay Area.

1:05

We'll be doing a show in San Francisco

1:08

and Sacramento. Then

1:11

we are heading to Texas

1:13

for shows in Dallas and

1:15

Austin, and then we were swinging

1:18

back around to California and doing a show

1:20

in San Diego. Now, at

1:22

the time of us recording this, we're still

1:25

finalizing some of the details, but

1:28

a few ticket links are already

1:30

live and up on our

1:33

link tree link Tree slash Bechtel Cast.

1:36

Which is also linked in the description. And

1:38

yeah, we're super excited

1:40

to be back on the road. We

1:43

hear you Bechdel Cast listeners

1:46

that we need to get off our asses

1:48

and get off the West coast. So you'll

1:51

see a lot of that in the coming months,

1:53

and we're excited. We were particularly

1:56

excited to go to Austin because we

1:58

had a show in Austin that was sold

2:00

out scheduled for April

2:02

twenty twenty and you'll never believe

2:04

what happened next. So we are excited to finally,

2:07

almost four years later, make

2:09

it back to Austin and head

2:12

over to Dallas as well. So and we're just

2:14

pumped to be back on tour. Yes,

2:17

and for this live show, you'll

2:19

know from the title we covered, it's a wonderful

2:22

life, is it? We

2:25

spent some time pondering

2:27

deciding, and another

2:30

important element of this show

2:33

is that half of the proceeds from this show

2:36

went to ANARA and PCRF.

2:38

These are both nonprofits that

2:41

are contributing to aid taking

2:44

place in Gaza right now. Of course, if

2:46

you're listening and you are a

2:49

person in the world, you're very

2:51

likely aware of what's going on in

2:53

Gaza right now. There is not a

2:55

lot of aid reaching Gaza because

2:58

of the horrific uenocytal practices

3:00

that are taking place around Gaza.

3:03

However, we wanted to do what

3:06

we can not just by making our

3:08

politics very clear on the show. I

3:10

know we've referenced it, but for

3:13

the sake of just being explicit about

3:16

it on the feed. Yeah,

3:18

So half of the money from the show went

3:20

to the PCRF is short for Palestine

3:23

Children's Relief Fund. An ERA is

3:25

short for America Near East Refugee

3:27

Aid. So that money has been

3:29

donated and sincerely

3:32

hope that the aid that is being sent

3:34

is able to actually reach the people

3:36

of Gaza as soon

3:38

as possible. Free Palestine.

3:43

America is the worst place in the world.

3:46

So that was what we are

3:50

doing, in addition to continuing to raise

3:52

awareness as we can. That

3:55

said, we really appreciate everyone who

3:57

came out to the show. We had a really great time.

4:00

And who watched the live stream blog? Yes,

4:02

bought tickets to the live stream. Yes,

4:04

really appreciate you supporting

4:07

us, supporting this fundraising

4:09

effort. Thank you so much.

4:12

Yes, we recorded. It was

4:14

our first show at Dynasty Typewriter

4:16

in Los Angeles, so huge shout out

4:18

to Dynasty and their team. God,

4:21

it was so cool. The live

4:23

stream setup there is wonderful. The vibes

4:25

are immaculate, and we had

4:27

the best time.

4:28

We really did.

4:29

If you caught the live stream, thank you. If

4:31

you were there, it got to hang out even

4:34

better. And we're excited

4:36

to hit more cities and see more

4:38

listeners soon.

4:40

So true.

4:41

But for now we've got business

4:43

to do.

4:44

Well and then one more live

4:46

show for you to plug Jamie.

4:49

Okay, Yes, if you're in the

4:51

Los Angeles area, and you should

4:53

be, please head out to the

4:55

Allegian Theater, where we've also done live shows

4:57

in the past, the Allegiant Theater in LA

5:00

we will be doing a live reading

5:03

of the first and most

5:05

recent, certainly not last, installment

5:08

of Santi University. If

5:10

you're listening to the Bexxel cast and you don't know what

5:12

Santi University.

5:13

Is get with the program.

5:15

Shame on you, Shame on

5:17

you kind of Santi University

5:20

is a bit, but

5:22

is it.

5:23

That it's real? It's okay, it's

5:25

a documentary.

5:26

It's hundreds of pages I've written at this

5:28

point, so I feel like it has

5:30

to be real. It's

5:33

a scream a six hundred allegedly

5:35

six hundred page screenplay that

5:37

we've been doing every holiday season. I'll

5:39

write a new twenty to thirty

5:41

pages, depending on how much time I

5:43

give myself to write it each

5:46

year. It's super jokey, it's super goofy.

5:48

We can link an example in the description.

5:51

But it's like my favorite

5:53

thing to do in the world, because

5:56

besides the Bechel cast, of course, it's like the most

5:58

it's the most brain My favorite brain dead

6:00

activity and the entire planet is writing

6:03

Santa University. I don't use one brain cell.

6:05

I have six panic attacks and

6:08

it's not good, so you should come.

6:10

Caitlyn will be reprising their

6:12

treasured holiday role of

6:15

Sully.

6:16

Okay, best character scene, steal

6:18

it. Where's the spin off?

6:20

You know?

6:20

Six seasons in a movie for Sully, Sully

6:23

High School, Sully High.

6:25

Oh my gosh, I'll fine I'll write it. You

6:27

don't have to twist my arm.

6:28

Just to give you an idea of the

6:31

kinds of characters found in this world. Sully

6:34

is a character who's from Weston,

6:36

Massachusetts, who fired

6:40

the protagonist Dan Santa from

6:42

Lydd's and

6:45

generally, wait, Kitlyn, will you do Sully's

6:48

iconic line.

6:50

Oh my god, you're so fucking beautiful?

6:53

So it's also a feminist test.

6:57

Sully appreciates women

6:59

and he cat calls all the right reasons.

7:03

Anyways, you should come hang out. We're donating

7:05

all the proceeds from that show to a

7:08

nonprofit that I love very much. I volunteer

7:10

with them, CILA that supports the

7:12

unhoused community in La So,

7:15

even if it's the worst show on the planet, and

7:17

it might be, your

7:20

money is going to a wonderful

7:23

place, So come out. We'll link that as

7:26

well. But you know what, show definitely

7:28

wasn't the worst show in the world. It was, in fact one of the

7:30

best, and maybe in fact the best.

7:32

The one that you're about to hear. So, without much

7:34

further ado, please enjoy our live

7:37

episode of It's a

7:39

Wonderful Life.

7:53

Hi, Welcome to the Bechdelcast.

7:58

Hello La

8:00

it's us and we live here

8:03

and you live here.

8:03

Maybe we

8:06

went shopping together this morning to get

8:08

these fits together.

8:11

I have a very cool shirt under

8:14

this, and maybe I'll

8:16

take this sweater off at some point.

8:20

We haven't done an LA live

8:23

show in a bit, and

8:25

I think that one of the last ones we did.

8:27

At least you did an actual strip

8:29

tease because we were covering magic mic.

8:31

Yes, round of applause

8:34

if you were at that show. Wow,

8:37

so you saw that was.

8:39

One of the most wait Titanic quote.

8:42

It was the most erotic experience.

8:45

Of my life up until then,

8:48

at least last March.

8:49

You and I start making out right now, we start

8:52

making out and then you start drawing

8:54

me. Yeah, yes, that's how that would

8:57

work. Yes, anyways, thanks for

8:59

coming. Things

9:01

were coming at four pm. Two We're like, do people

9:03

come out at four pm? Let's find out.

9:07

It's a little scary. It's it's dark

9:09

out though, so that's and it feels

9:11

like night. And that concludes

9:13

our kind of warm up portion.

9:15

Of the show. Shout out to anyone

9:18

watching the live stream. Yes, I

9:20

oh yeah, say whoo for them.

9:25

They're so mad they're not in the little

9:27

seats, aren't they there? Okay,

9:31

give it up if you have if you have

9:34

listened to the Bechdel Cast before, we like to take

9:36

a chance. Okay,

9:39

free applause. Give it

9:41

up. If you have been dragged here by someone

9:44

who listens to the Bechdel Cast and you're scared and

9:46

you don't know what's gonna happen. Oh

9:50

oh my, the lights went up and

9:52

I just saw one guy like, whoo

9:57

if you're a god his eyes but he was ready.

10:00

He's good.

10:00

We're scary, Yeah.

10:02

We're scary. We're scared, but we're wearing

10:04

nice little outfits. So it's

10:07

all about aesthetics, that's true. So

10:09

the movie we're covering today, if you can't tell

10:13

from our our very festive apparel, is

10:15

a movie that we have. I feel like because

10:17

our show has been around for so long, we

10:19

have covered so many holiday movies,

10:22

yes, right down to the one that came out on

10:24

Netflix last year where Lindsay Lohan gets

10:26

bonked on the head, right, But

10:30

we hadn't covered one

10:32

that is considered a

10:35

classic, which is It's a Wonderful

10:37

Life. So just

10:40

to take the temp once more, give

10:43

it up. If you have seen and

10:46

enjoy a wonderful life, all

10:49

right, and if

10:51

you haven't seen it, okay,

10:55

brave, brave, I had it. I don't know. I haven't

10:57

seen shit. I watched The

11:00

Godfather in March and I was like, it's pretty

11:02

good. You guys, they're

11:05

kind of the Godfather's kind of a slave.

11:09

These these frank sees

11:12

know how to direct a movie. That's

11:14

a reference to this movie directed by Frank

11:16

Capra and Francis Ford Coppola,

11:19

who maybe was also called Frank.

11:21

I don't know.

11:22

We don't know. There's no way to know, because

11:25

he's alive. I just remembered so

11:27

we could ask him

11:30

to get to get started. Caitlin, Yes, what

11:32

is your history with the movie?

11:34

It's a Wonderful Life? Nineteen forty six.

11:37

So I saw the movie

11:39

for the first time. I

11:41

was like probably eighteen or nineteen. I

11:43

did not grow up with this movie, so

11:46

I have no nostalgic attachment

11:48

to it, and I

11:52

controversially.

11:53

Do not really like this

11:56

movie.

11:57

Sorry, thank you. I

12:00

have good reasons. I find

12:03

Jimmy Stewart irritating. Sorry,

12:06

thank you again. He's irritating.

12:08

Okay, I disagree with that.

12:10

A lot of people do. I am in the minority.

12:12

I do think, but I find his character to

12:14

be mostly unlikable, and

12:17

yeah, I just I'm not a fan, but

12:19

I'm gonna set that aside and

12:22

look at this movie objectively for

12:24

this episode, I wink.

12:29

Can I just say, I would just want to start

12:31

by commending you for your bravery, thank

12:33

you for watching the movie

12:36

on Oh I want Okay, wait,

12:38

my history with this movie, Lease tell me is

12:41

that I had not seen it.

12:43

Like most movies we've covered on the show,

12:45

it's usually my first time watching it, unless

12:49

it's like the Lindzie McGuire movie. I'm like, yeah, I've

12:51

seen this movie five hundred times. I've

12:53

seen bad movies five hundred times. This one I hadn't seen,

12:57

and I started watching it for

12:59

It's available for free on

13:02

Roku tv right now asterisk.

13:05

They couldn't afford the music, so

13:08

they've replaced it with like Baby Einstein

13:10

music, And

13:13

I would really recommend that experience

13:18

because it's so jarry. If I

13:20

hadn't been watching the movie with someone

13:22

that was like, hold on, something is very

13:24

wrong because in

13:27

the Roku TV one, every time Clarence

13:31

not the elf in my mind, Okay,

13:33

the thing is, I'm gonna fuck up repeatedly

13:35

in this episode. I'm gonna call them Clarence the Elf,

13:39

and I'm gonna call Bedford Falls New Bedford,

13:41

Massachusetts, and

13:44

that will keep happening, and I will not apologize

13:46

for That's fine. But yeah,

13:49

anytime like in this, I don't

13:51

even know what happens in the original score, but

13:54

they add in this royalty free

13:57

alphabet song. Every time

14:00

is on the screen, it goes bloom bloom

14:02

bloom bloom bloom boom boom

14:05

boom boom boom, like and you're just

14:07

like, this could Twin beIN a Little Star

14:09

ABC DFG. It's the same tune.

14:11

Oh that is it, Caitlin

14:15

a bct twin?

14:17

Okay, yeah, I see it.

14:21

The lack of trust between us,

14:24

it's the I only learned that from like clickbait

14:27

in twenty twelve or something. I don't

14:29

know. It's like, did you know some

14:32

crack dot comshit on their on their crack dot

14:34

comshit. Anyways, I had

14:36

not seen it before. I started watching

14:39

it with the wrong music and I got scared. H

14:42

And then I watched it for a second time with the correct music,

14:44

and I liked it better.

14:45

Uh.

14:47

I I have complicated feelings towards

14:49

this movie because I didn't grow up with it. My

14:52

family never showed it to me,

14:54

and I asked my mom why and she answered

14:57

with one word, which was boring.

15:01

She's not wrong.

15:03

She's not wrong. The thing is, like, I

15:05

think this is I well, actually,

15:07

round of applause. If you grew up with this movie

15:10

and watched it as a kid, weirdos.

15:15

This is such a depressing, like

15:17

weird long movie. It

15:20

opens with

15:23

with a man about to take his own life

15:25

because he's been told by society that he's

15:27

worth more dead than alive, and you, as a

15:29

six year old, were

15:31

like, let them cook, Like that's

15:35

that's interesting. I yeah, I think that if I saw this

15:37

when I was a kid, I would have left the

15:39

room and been like, could we turn on SpongeBob?

15:41

But like, you know, not that Christmas

15:43

Carol the only Christmas movie, right,

15:46

I like, because we're babies and

15:50

so anyways, I hadn't seen it. I watch it for the first

15:52

time to get ready for this episode, and I

15:54

have like complicated feelings towards

15:56

it because I think in some ways there

15:59

were parts where I felt very emotional. I

16:01

was like, wow, I like, I am surprised

16:03

that these sort of values are being shown

16:06

in a movie from the forties. And then in other ways,

16:08

I'm like, why is he yelling at his wife

16:10

in every scene there? Why

16:12

is he yelling or aggressively

16:15

forcing a kiss on.

16:17

To Donna Read in every single

16:19

scene? And so I would say, I don't

16:21

know. I'm willing to be swayed, okay,

16:24

And I am afraid and and I will also qualify

16:26

that with I am actively afraid of fans of

16:28

this movie.

16:31

Mm hmmm.

16:32

And I don't want to get yelled

16:34

at, but I

16:37

but we have a job to do, and we're and

16:39

that is why you're here. And we've famously

16:41

never been wrong before, so

16:43

true. Why start now?

16:46

All right? Shall I do the recap.

16:48

Caitlin's famous recap? Let's do it?

16:50

Okay? Here we go? Wow,

16:53

thank you?

16:55

All right.

16:55

So we're gonna place some content warning for

16:57

suicide right here, which.

16:59

Is a wild way to have to open a holiday

17:02

movie.

17:03

That's like, yes,

17:05

okay, so we open in

17:08

Bedford Falls.

17:11

Ever heard of it? I think it's

17:13

an upstate New York is my best guess.

17:16

That's what upstate New York is

17:18

really like, I was reading.

17:20

I went in so deep on the parts

17:23

of this movie that don't matter. There's

17:25

been arguments for the better part of a century

17:27

of like were they referencing this town in

17:29

upstate New York or was it just a

17:31

guy being like there's a town hm,

17:34

hm, will never matter, It doesn't

17:36

matter. It's New Bedford. Yeah.

17:39

So there are a bunch

17:41

of voices praying asking

17:44

that George Bailey be helped.

17:46

Then we see some stars

17:49

in the night sky or is

17:51

it heaven.

17:53

The heavens even maybe

17:57

they're talking because the stars are actually

17:59

angels and they

18:02

hear people's prayers about George Bailey,

18:04

and they send an angel named

18:06

Clarence to help George, not.

18:09

Before insulting Clarence, Oh

18:12

my gosh, being like where is I

18:14

feel like Clarence has big Dan

18:17

Santa energy to me, and that

18:19

they're like, this angel looks

18:22

like shit, he can't

18:24

even read, can't even read. We

18:27

don't like him, we don't respect him.

18:29

But and that shows

18:31

what the heavens feel about George Bailey. They're

18:33

sending him their very worst.

18:37

So true. Okay, so the

18:39

reason Clarence is going to go help George

18:41

is because he is thinking of ending his

18:44

life. Clarence has

18:46

not gotten his wings yet,

18:48

his angel wings. So the

18:50

other angels say that if he's

18:53

able to help George, he will get his wings,

18:55

So ulterior motives they're

18:57

there. It's true, he doesn't

18:59

get about actually helping someone. He's just like I

19:02

want my wings, right, And.

19:04

We could argue, you know, the level of like

19:06

how well does Clarence actually do it his job?

19:08

I mean it's kind of up for you

19:11

know, it's up for this guy. And I hear that there's some Clarence

19:13

heads and that are.

19:15

Like he did what he had to do,

19:18

Clarence, I think ultimately spoiler

19:20

alert at the end, when Clarence does

19:23

get his wings, I just like wanted

19:25

like a centerfold, like a nude centerfold.

19:30

With Clarence and his wings.

19:31

Oh, and you want him to be nude

19:34

for that?

19:35

For me, he would have to be nude for that there.

19:37

Okay, can you imagine the cover like

19:42

December nineteen forty six, Clarence

19:44

gets his wings and then you open

19:46

the magazine it is nude Clarence, huge

19:48

wingspance.

19:49

Wow. And

19:51

this would be where in like in Playboy

19:53

magazine magazine Okay.

19:55

Yeah, Horny Sex God magazine.

19:58

Okay, all right, Well anyway, so

20:03

the other angels start telling Clarence

20:05

about George, and so most of the

20:07

movie is flashbacks

20:09

to George's life, starting

20:11

with George Bailey as a kid. He

20:14

saved his little brother Harry when

20:16

he fell through some thin ice.

20:20

Uh.

20:20

Then George, who

20:23

works at a drug store

20:26

child labor alert. He

20:29

prevents someone from getting poisoned

20:32

because the druggist mister Gower,

20:34

accidentally tries to give someone

20:36

poison capsules instead of medicine.

20:40

Because his son died. Caately,

20:42

I'm his son died, so he was

20:44

crying so he couldn't see the huge

20:47

jug of poison. He

20:50

got confused. He was having a

20:52

bad day. It could have been any of us

20:54

among us hasn't accidently poisoned

20:56

the child.

21:00

Okay, So we also meet mister Potter. He's

21:02

played by Lionel Barrymore. He's

21:04

the richest man in town. He's very mean,

21:07

he's very evil, and he's always

21:09

trying to put the building

21:11

in loan that George's

21:13

father and his uncle Billy run.

21:16

Mister Potter is trying to put it out of business all

21:18

the time.

21:18

Mister Potter very much the villain, however,

21:21

I think one of the most like I haven't

21:24

seen a more iconic movie

21:26

wheelchair than mister Potter.

21:29

I mean he's had it retrofitted

21:31

into a full thrown throne.

21:34

Yes, and I respect that

21:36

about him and nothing else.

21:38

Right, Yeah, Okay, So we cut to George

21:40

Bailey as a young man. He's now played by

21:42

James Stewart. His whole thing

21:44

is he can't wait to get out of his

21:46

town of Bedford Falls aka

21:49

New bed Massachusetts.

21:51

Yeah, he wants much more than this provincial life.

21:54

I literally wrote that in my Yes,

21:56

That's why he keeps fucking

21:58

saying it.

21:59

I'm like, have you not seen Beauty the Beast

22:01

nineteen ninety one, bitch?

22:04

Yeah, So he can't wait to get out explore

22:06

the world. He has a trip coming

22:08

up that he where he's gonna go to Europe and

22:10

then he's gonna go to college after that. So

22:13

then we meet some townspeople such

22:16

as Ernie the cab driver, Bert

22:18

the cop, and then we're like okay, Burt

22:21

and Ernie.

22:22

And then and then we're like, oh no, Wikipedia

22:25

is ahead of us on this, and

22:27

it's a coincidence. Sorry, yeah,

22:30

right there, we're

22:33

gonna start a conspiracy.

22:36

Jim Hen's a you fucking liar.

22:40

Okay. Then we also meet Violet. She's

22:43

blonde and she's hot, and she's

22:46

an icon. I love Violet. I

22:48

mean I wish we so

22:50

dirty in this movie. Well we'll get back to. Yeah.

22:53

We also meet George's mother, another

22:56

woman we barely know anything about anyway.

22:59

What's her first what's her first name?

23:02

Mama?

23:03

Missus? Okay. George

23:06

heads to his brother

23:08

Harry's graduation party. This is where

23:10

he reconnects with Mary

23:13

played by Donna Reid, and

23:15

they see each other and they are both like uh

23:18

wooga, and

23:20

they start dancing, and then there's this

23:22

whole thing where they fall into a swimming

23:24

pool.

23:26

This is a like, I'm okay

23:28

with a swimming pool jump scare. That's

23:31

gonna be good for me in every movie. However,

23:33

this whole sequence, and I know that,

23:35

like I don't know, there's no good

23:37

way to do this other than truly casting

23:40

a younger actor to play the character

23:42

when they're younger. But there's a whole

23:44

twenty minute chunk of this movie where

23:46

a visibly forty year old Jimmy

23:49

Stewart is supposed to be twenty one.

23:51

Yeah, and it's so confusing,

23:53

it's unbelievably confusing, because you have to like go

23:56

through all of these layers of dissonance, which

23:58

is, first of all, like even Riverdale

24:00

wasn't pushing like this. Yeah,

24:03

you know, it's like he looks his age

24:06

and that's great, but he keeps

24:08

being like how old are you? And I'm like how old are

24:10

you? And he's like

24:12

twenty one and You're like, no, you're not, you

24:14

fucking liar. And then and then on top

24:17

of that, you have to like weave through the fact

24:19

that the age gaps

24:21

between hetero Hollywood

24:23

couples have always been so huge that

24:25

Donna Reid does look closer

24:28

to the age she's supposed to be and Jimmy Stewart looks

24:30

forty, and like, is this canonically predatory

24:32

or is it just casting predatory And

24:35

anyways, it's casting predatory and Jimmy

24:37

Stewart's definitely twenty one.

24:40

Yeah, so confusing. Also

24:42

another movie where at least young

24:45

characters, maybe not young actors, but young

24:47

characters are in a swimming

24:49

pool thinking fully closed, just

24:52

like say it with me now, Leonardo

24:55

DiCaprio, fake fans

24:59

on fuck believable, look

25:02

it up.

25:04

No, yeah, people fully clothed in the pool,

25:06

having a coming of age moment. Yeah,

25:09

it's a timeless trope, it is.

25:10

Yeah, Well, normally the young

25:12

people having a coming of age moment are in

25:14

there, like swimwear.

25:17

Yeah, but if you're Leonardo DiCaprio, you're

25:19

fully clothed every time, and we don't know why,

25:22

yes, exactly.

25:24

Okay, So they fall in a swimming

25:26

pool, and then we cut to later that evening,

25:28

they're walking around, they're flirting,

25:31

they walk past this old rundown

25:34

house that Mary loves.

25:36

Will put a pin in that, and she's

25:38

wearing a robe because her clothes

25:40

got wet from falling in the swimming pool.

25:43

And so there's this part where her

25:45

robe falls off and she's naked

25:47

and she's hiding in the bushes and we will

25:50

just have to talk about that later because

25:52

it's too much right now. Then

25:56

George gets word that his father

25:59

had a he dies

26:01

from it. So George

26:04

feels obligated to cancel his trip

26:06

to Europe and to take over his father's

26:08

business, the Bailey Building

26:10

and Loan. The evil mister

26:12

Potter, who is a board member,

26:15

tries to dissolve it, but George

26:18

makes this impassioned speech

26:21

and the board votes to keep

26:23

the building and loan going as long

26:25

as George is in charge, which like

26:27

messes with his plans to go to

26:29

college and explore the world. So now he's

26:31

stuck in Bedford Falls.

26:33

He's a forty year old college freshman.

26:36

He's way behind.

26:39

He keeps like it really is so

26:42

watching this movie for the first time in the past

26:44

week was so jarring because he's talking

26:46

to his father and he's like, I have to go to college.

26:48

I'm like, yeah, man, hurry up, you're

26:51

running out of time.

26:53

Yeah, So he feels stuck

26:56

in his town at least until his brother Harry,

26:58

finishes college so that Harry can

27:00

take over the family business. But four

27:03

years later, when Harry returns

27:05

from school, Harry's wife's

27:07

father has offered Harry a job, so

27:10

George has to stay with the

27:12

building and loan. Then

27:14

George's mother urges him to

27:17

get with Mary, who has

27:20

also been away at school until now,

27:22

but George doesn't want to compete with his friend

27:25

Sam Wainwright, who

27:27

was very much like all the adults

27:30

in the graduate who are like, you got to get

27:32

into plastics. That's

27:35

Sam Waynwright huge.

27:37

Yeah, he started the trend. Yeah.

27:39

Yeah. He's also in love.

27:41

With Mary well, but is

27:43

he though, because you cut to him on the phone

27:45

and you're like, well, he seems to be cheating

27:48

on her today.

27:51

Yeah, and he more calls for a

27:53

business proposal than like a social

27:56

calling to talk.

27:56

To George, which is interesting because the house

27:58

he calls George does not live at. I

28:00

know, but you know, I think

28:03

that that is just like Hollywood coding

28:05

for he's a dog. We don't care, yeah

28:07

about this Sam waying Wright character. George

28:10

is a good guy. But then you're like, is he is

28:13

it a wonderful life even we

28:16

don't know?

28:18

Anyway, So George goes over

28:20

to Mary's house and she's

28:22

very excited to see him, but he is

28:25

such an asshole to her in this

28:27

scene, and she gets visibly upset

28:29

about it, and then he grabs

28:31

her and screams on her face. But

28:34

don't worry, they will get married.

28:36

In the next scene.

28:39

Cut to their mary wedding.

28:43

I was watching this

28:46

with someone near dear to

28:48

my heart, and they were crying through that entire

28:50

scene. I was like, I don't

28:52

understand what is beautiful

28:54

about the scene. But but you

28:57

know, life comes at you fast.

28:59

Yes, Okay. So then

29:01

George and Mary are headed

29:03

to their luxurious honeymoon

29:05

with a stack of cash.

29:08

Which is really cool of them, I think. I

29:10

mean, is that what happened in nineteen

29:12

forty six, Like, here's my budget,

29:15

Like it's just in your hand. Scary.

29:17

Yeah, this is like pre Venmo

29:19

certainly I know that.

29:21

Oh my god.

29:25

Okay, then the

29:27

stock market crash of nineteen twenty

29:30

nine happens.

29:31

I think that happens in Titanic too. Did

29:33

it happen in real life?

29:36

But sound up

29:38

in the comments?

29:44

Uh huh

29:47

Okay. So everyone's rushing to take their money

29:49

out of the bank. So George turns

29:51

around and goes to the building a loan where a bunch

29:54

of people are demanding their money. But

29:57

uncle Billy had given away all the cash

29:59

to the bank to pay off

30:01

a loan or I don't know.

30:03

What I love about uncle Billy is that he's

30:06

professionally known as uncle Billy.

30:09

You never hear anyone call him billy,

30:12

whether they're his peer, his

30:14

relative, his client, they're

30:17

all like, uncle Billy, you fuck up? Yes,

30:20

get that bird out the way, okay.

30:23

So they don't have any cash on hand

30:25

to give to the customers, and mister Potter

30:27

is threatening to steal all

30:29

of the customers and close down the

30:32

business. So then George has to shell

30:34

out his own personal stack of cash

30:37

that he was going to use for his honeymoon and

30:39

he gives it to all the townspeople in order

30:41

to save the business. Then

30:44

he's like, oh, right, it's my wedding day.

30:46

I have to call my wife.

30:49

He's like, oh, yeah, I left my wife in a

30:51

running car six hours ago.

30:55

Better check in.

30:56

And she's like, come to this address.

30:59

So he shows up and it's the old Rundown

31:01

house that Mary has always loved,

31:04

and now it's their house.

31:06

I think they're squatting in it.

31:09

I actually think I have Uh well, I was gonna

31:11

say this later, but like I think that that is like if

31:13

that is because I wasn't able to find any

31:16

maybe some listeners understand the plot

31:19

reason why that happened, But if they really did

31:21

see an unclaimed house and then

31:23

just reclaimed it, I think that that is like one

31:25

of the more radical things that happens in the movie.

31:27

Truly. Yeah, I'm fine with it.

31:29

Yeah, I mean that happens now and

31:31

it's like necessary and cool because

31:34

there's so much housing that's just like left empty.

31:37

So I'm like, yeah, this mansion you've been throwing rocks

31:39

at for twenty years. Clearly no one

31:41

lives here. Move the fuck in see

31:43

who yells at you?

31:44

Yeah, but she has prepared a little

31:46

honeymoon for them at this house.

31:49

We cut to sometime later. George

31:51

Bailey has set up this place

31:54

called Bailey Park where a lot of his customers

31:56

have built homes. People who used

31:59

to live in mister Potter shitty houses

32:01

and you know, pay rent to him because

32:03

he's an evil landlord, but now

32:05

they're homeowners thanks to George.

32:08

Then mister Potter offers George

32:10

a job, I think in an

32:13

effort to like eliminate him as a competitor,

32:16

and he's offering George much better

32:18

pay, which would give him the freedom

32:20

to travel around the world. But George

32:23

is like, no, I just remembered

32:25

that I hate you, so no thanks.

32:28

I I do like that scene though, because

32:30

he's like offer, you know, like he has like a carrot

32:32

dangled in front of him of like, isn't capitalism

32:34

the best? And George is

32:36

like, yeah, I want a nice shoe.

32:39

And

32:42

then there's this like great slash

32:44

weird acting choice from Jimmy

32:47

Stewart where he shakes mister Potter's hand, and

32:49

then he pulls it away because

32:51

he's decided that capitalism is bad. Actually,

32:54

but he's played away like there's something

32:56

on the.

32:56

Hand like peepee

32:59

and pooh pooh.

32:59

It's like they're like, wait a second,

33:03

mister Potter has shit on his like

33:07

or come or jelly or just something unpleasant

33:10

to find on a hand. Yeah,

33:12

and that's what changed. That's what made him realize

33:14

capitalism was bad. Yes, yes, it

33:17

was come on that.

33:18

We can all agree with that, yes.

33:22

Added to the Wikipedia.

33:25

So George then goes home and

33:28

his wife tells

33:31

him that she's gregnant.

33:34

Yeah, and then she just starts t shirt

33:36

gunning him out. Oh my

33:38

god, right, great, great, great, four greg's

33:41

in total.

33:41

Yes.

33:42

Yeah.

33:43

But also there's a war on there is

33:46

so before that, you know, they have a couple of

33:48

kids. Mary fixes up their house,

33:51

George continues working at the building

33:53

and loan, and then World War two begins.

33:56

A bunch of men go to

33:59

fight in the war. Did

34:01

that happen in real life? I wonder, I don't

34:03

know.

34:03

It's concept once again,

34:06

what is this USO they spoke?

34:08

I don't know.

34:09

But George stays behind because

34:11

of a hearing impairment, that when

34:14

he saved his brother from falling through the

34:16

ice, he lost hearing in one ear. Then

34:19

his brother Harry comes back a

34:21

war hero, if there's any

34:23

such thing as a hero

34:26

of war.

34:28

Again, very brief, thank

34:31

you so much.

34:32

Okay, anyway, it's Christmas Eve now and

34:35

Uncle Billy is about to make a deposit

34:38

to the bank of eight thousand dollars

34:40

in cash. I did the math.

34:43

That is about one hundred and twenty five thousand

34:45

dollars in twenty twenty three money just

34:48

for inflation.

34:49

Not to come down too hard

34:51

on uncle Billy. But if you saw how many

34:53

squirrels are in this man's office,

34:57

would you give him that amount of money

35:00

cash to deposit.

35:02

He's simply too eccentric to

35:04

get that amount of money in cash.

35:07

It's true. And what he does is absent

35:10

mindedly tuck the cash

35:12

into a newspaper that he then hands

35:14

to mister Potter, who realizes

35:17

Uncle Billy's mistake but doesn't tell

35:19

anyone and just steals the money spoiler

35:22

alert.

35:22

Even with the happy ending of this movie,

35:25

mister Potter gets away with this. It's

35:27

really interesting, I mean realistic.

35:30

I think, well, yeah, it's another part of the movie. I like,

35:32

not that that happened, but that, like, you

35:34

know, it's realistic. Rich people

35:36

get away with sheet all the time.

35:38

Yep, oh too real for

35:40

you. Okay, wait

35:44

does that happen?

35:45

Sound up in the comments?

35:49

Okay, So Uncle Billy is obviously

35:51

freaking out about having lost this money.

35:54

George is freaking out. If they don't come

35:56

up with it, they'll go bankrupt and maybe even

35:58

end up in prison. So

36:01

George goes home. He screams

36:04

at his wife and his children. He kicks

36:06

some furniture over. We'll also talk

36:08

about this scene.

36:09

In more details, like what why

36:12

are you upset?

36:15

Then he leaves and goes

36:17

to mister Potter asking for a loan

36:20

of eight thousand dollars, and mister

36:22

Potter wants some collateral, so

36:24

George offers up his life insurance policy

36:26

worth fifteen thousand dollars, and he

36:28

realizes he's worth more dead

36:31

than alive, so George

36:34

leaves. He gets drunk at

36:36

Martini's bar. He crashes

36:38

his car into a tree, and then he

36:41

goes to a bridge and is about to jump

36:43

and end his life when

36:46

suddenly someone else jumps

36:48

in the river. It is Clarence

36:50

the guardian angel who was sent to help him.

36:53

So George jumps in to

36:56

save Clarence, and we

36:58

cut to them in some

37:01

place.

37:02

That part of the movie is like where the Baby Einstein

37:05

gets especially scary,

37:08

where through this whole like really

37:10

intense not just emotionally

37:12

charged, but like socially charged scene because we're

37:15

talking about how suicide

37:17

is perceived in the culture

37:19

at this point, and it's just Baby

37:21

Einstein, Twinkle Twinkle Little Star playing

37:24

beneath the whole thing. It's interesting. You

37:27

should check it out. Superior

37:29

cut.

37:31

Yeah, go to Roku dot

37:33

com. Uh, okay.

37:35

So as they're in this like office,

37:38

I don't know, they're drying off and warming

37:40

up, and George is like,

37:42

ough, everybody would be better off if

37:44

I was never born, and Clarence

37:46

is like, oh really, because let

37:49

me show you how things would be if you were

37:51

never born.

37:52

You're like, wait a second, there's

37:54

only twenty minutes left in the movie. He's

37:56

starting the Christmas Carol now, yeah,

37:59

and he is doing that.

38:01

I also liken it to the

38:04

second half of Back to the Future

38:06

two, when Marty goes back to nineteen eighty five

38:09

and like Biff is the president or whatever.

38:12

I haven't seen it. Oh my god, I'm

38:15

so young. Sorry, guys.

38:19

Okay, so Clarence takes George around

38:21

town to show him this alternate

38:24

reality if George never

38:26

existed.

38:27

Hot take it looks fun.

38:29

It looks so much more fun

38:31

Pottersville.

38:32

They're like, we replaced the loans office

38:34

with a strip club.

38:35

You're like, great, nice,

38:37

but that's not what the movie would have you think.

38:39

It's like, oh my god, look how disgusting this place

38:41

is now.

38:42

More municipal buildings here.

38:46

Okay, First of all, the town is no longer called Bedford

38:48

Falls, it's now Pottersville.

38:50

That's bad. Fine.

38:52

Most of the businesses are bars,

38:54

nightclubs, strip clubs, casinos.

38:58

None of George.

38:58

Fine, Potter, you're the cool guy

39:00

in yes kind he knows how

39:02

to party.

39:03

Yeah.

39:05

Uh.

39:05

None of Georgia's friends recognize

39:07

him. Everyone is just kind of

39:09

like mean and in a bad mood.

39:12

Mister Gower, the druggist is

39:14

an ex con and an

39:16

alcoholic. Because George wasn't around to

39:18

stop him from accidentally poisoning

39:20

someone brutal. George is

39:23

like, what the fuck is going on?

39:24

His brother is dead?

39:26

Yeah, yes, but I kept.

39:29

Well, this is like way too far in the weeds. But

39:31

I was like, but really, if we thought

39:33

about it, if George never existed,

39:35

would his brother have even been invited

39:38

to that ice hang that day?

39:40

Probably not, and maybe the world would be better.

39:43

Makes you think, yeah, maybe it would

39:46

be better if he didn't exist. But

39:48

that's not the point of the movie.

39:49

Sorry, maybe it does not explore that at all.

39:53

Everyone's upset at that idea. Sorry.

39:57

Okay, So George goes to

39:59

his house, but it's

40:02

not the nice house that his wife his

40:04

wife fixed up. It's still abandoned

40:06

like it was when he was a teenager. His

40:09

family isn't there because

40:12

Mary never got

40:14

married. She's a quote unquote old

40:16

maid who became a librarian.

40:19

Okay, and this

40:22

this scene is so iconic,

40:25

it's so awesome where they're

40:27

like, what if you were thirty

40:29

one years old wearing Warby

40:31

Parker lenses with

40:34

a job, and you're like, I would

40:36

fucking kill for that dude. That's

40:38

like, of course, that's

40:41

great news for her there, and she

40:43

reacts appropriately because there's a man chasing

40:45

her around, which is also how he acted

40:48

when he was her husband. She

40:51

arguably got a better deal in the dystopia.

40:54

Absolutely yes, because she could just

40:56

go to bars and strip clubs with

40:58

her own money.

40:59

M M.

41:00

Yeah, George is like chasing

41:02

her and then she I think

41:04

faints because women be fainting.

41:07

She's also more brunette in

41:09

a way that felt aggressive,

41:11

but.

41:11

You know, the movie acts like her like

41:14

never getting married is the is a fate

41:16

worse than death. Also, George's

41:19

mom does not recognize him. He learns

41:21

that his brother Harry died as a child

41:23

because George wasn't there

41:26

to save him when he fell through the ice. And

41:28

Clarence is like, see, George,

41:31

you've touched so many people

41:34

in your life. And if he's

41:36

referred to all the times that George Bailey

41:38

violently grabs someone, then yes,

41:42

he has touched so many people his

41:46

ass. But

41:48

Clarence is like, George, You've had such a wonderful

41:50

life. It's a wonderful life

41:52

and that's the name of the movie, and

41:55

it would be a mistake to throw it all

41:57

away. So George

41:59

is like, Okay, you're right. So he runs

42:02

back to the bridge and

42:04

he prays to be alive again, and

42:07

that happens, and then

42:10

Bert the cop shows up. Parentheses

42:13

ACAB and.

42:16

Yeah, ACAB includes Bert and

42:18

I and

42:20

I would say like in an obvious way.

42:22

Yeah, yeah, And when you think about

42:24

it, yes, all cops are bastards,

42:27

but all cops are burt.

42:32

Wow, it's a wonderful life. The

42:34

Wonderful Hive is gonna come for us

42:37

for this one. Okay,

42:40

wait for like hot take George

42:42

shouldn't have been born?

42:45

Okay. So Bert the cop is like, hey,

42:48

George, I remember I know you. And

42:50

then George is like, wow, you recognize me. So

42:52

then he runs back through town. He's like, Merry

42:55

Christmas. He goes back home

42:57

and then some men are there to arrest

43:00

him for this eight thousand dollars deficit,

43:02

but he doesn't even freaking care

43:05

because he because.

43:06

It's a wonderful life. It turns out.

43:08

Yeah, and then all of

43:10

his friends show up and give him

43:13

a bunch of money because they heard he was

43:15

in trouble.

43:16

Which is what the minions do with grew

43:20

Wow, Indespicable Me one

43:22

twenty ten. I've

43:24

been sitting on this information for days.

43:28

The end of It's a Wonderful Life

43:30

very much mirrors the end of Despicable

43:32

Me, to the point where it may be a direct influence.

43:35

Wait which part where Grew

43:37

is trying to crowdfund his effort to go to the

43:39

moon, and then the minions give them gives

43:42

Grew their money because at this

43:44

point it appears that the millions are paid, which

43:47

goes away in later installments. Wow,

43:50

but it installment won. They have money

43:52

and they crowdfund Grew's effort to go to

43:54

the moon.

43:55

That's right. Anyway,

43:58

so his friends show up. I liked it like

44:00

the because I feel like they only each give like

44:02

one dollars, so I think he has like

44:05

two hundred and seventy four dollars at the

44:07

end.

44:07

But anyway, two hundred and seventy four friends,

44:11

I mean, wow, that's I mean,

44:13

not that many people came to the show. Like,

44:15

that's really cool. You have two

44:17

hundred and seventy four friends. I mean not as

44:19

a cop for you know, George Bailey.

44:21

But that's so true. But then his rich

44:24

friend Sam Wainwright is

44:26

like, here's a bunch of money, and then so he saved

44:28

the end. That's the movie.

44:30

Woo. I

44:44

think it's fun that Sam was like, remember

44:46

when you when you aggressively

44:49

quote unquote stole my girlfriend. Doesn't

44:52

matter, man, here's a million dollars

44:54

that's great.

44:55

That's progressive.

44:56

I love that. It's almost like the movie cares

44:58

what Mary wants.

45:00

Yeah, but it doesn't. All

45:02

right, So we're gonna before we get into the discussion,

45:05

we're gonna do a little fun

45:07

little thing and it's

45:10

a I'm gonna give you

45:12

the rules to a drinking game

45:15

that you can play, okay,

45:17

at a later time when you're watching the movie

45:19

if you want.

45:21

I'm excited.

45:22

Okay, So here are the rules. Is everyone ready?

45:25

Okay? So you drink every time? And that

45:27

one's you're

45:33

right to say this. You're right to say this.

45:35

Thanks, so okay.

45:37

I love that. I also find myself

45:39

wandering around the city being like, can I have a

45:41

million dollars? Hot Dog? I

45:44

thought it was great.

45:45

Also I realized I didn't say it. And this this

45:47

is a podcast, it's an audio medium

45:49

people will want to know. So

45:51

it says, drink every time George Bailey

45:53

says hot Dog parentheses

45:56

by raw Dog by Jamie Loftus. Okay,

45:58

and you're right to say it, and I'm right to say that. Next

46:01

side, please, so drink

46:03

every time. Every

46:06

time someone insults Clarence the

46:08

Guardian Angel, the other Angels

46:10

insult him, and then so does George

46:12

Bailey later on relentlessly.

46:15

It is very like, yeah, they're like, dude,

46:18

you look like shit, no wonder you don't

46:20

have wings? Yeah, you

46:22

have three brain cells that are currently operational.

46:25

How are you going to stop me from my problems? IQ

46:28

of the Rabbit is how he's literally introduced.

46:30

Literally yes, yes, next

46:33

line, so drink. When George Bailey

46:36

as a child says he's going to have harems

46:38

and multiple wives. That

46:42

only happens once in the movie, but you

46:44

should still. But it's a worth it.

46:46

It's a heavy sip, take a heavy zip,

46:49

finish your drink even it's impactful.

46:51

Yeah, yes, okay, next line, so

46:54

drink. Every time the plot is contingent on

46:56

you understanding how a building and loan

46:58

operates. But unfortunately you I don't understand,

47:01

and you don't know what that is.

47:04

You're just like, shouldn't it be one or the other?

47:07

I don't.

47:09

I read about it, and I still don't understand

47:11

how it works. So this is not a reading

47:13

podcast. And we've said that many times. We

47:17

hate books except for Rad

47:19

Doug, but

47:22

we love that Mary becomes

47:25

a librarian, so we

47:27

contain multitudes. Okay,

47:30

next slide. Please, so drink every

47:32

time you're reminded that houses used to cost

47:34

ten dollars and that we are all dying

47:37

of capitalism.

47:39

Also, there's mention of like a house

47:42

being worth five thousand dollars. I also did the

47:44

math for that. That is the equivalent of

47:46

eighty five thousand dollars more or less

47:48

in twenty twenty three. And

47:50

once again we are recording this in La,

47:53

where houses cost at least

47:55

a million dollars. Yeah, and that's

47:57

if they leak, and that's

48:00

if they're kind of shitty and

48:02

in the valley. No disrespect,

48:04

Oh my god, to

48:07

the valley.

48:12

I do not stand by the colon. Sorry,

48:22

we just lost fifty Patreon subscribers.

48:24

How dare you.

48:26

Round of applaza if you live in the valley.

48:29

I'm know your audience games, I'm so

48:31

sorry, and

48:34

he enjoyed the drive home.

48:39

Okay, next line, Okay,

48:42

drink. Drink

48:46

every time there's an enormous jar

48:49

of poison at a

48:51

pharmacy for some

48:53

reason. Okay, next line,

48:57

drink every time Violet Bic and George Bailey

48:59

are so horny for each other that they nearly pass

49:01

out.

49:01

We'll get back to that. Yeah, Yes.

49:05

Next slide, drink every time George

49:07

and his mother kiss on the lips.

49:12

It happens at least twice.

49:14

It's nuts how much

49:17

this happens. She's like,

49:19

and I feel like it is indicated in

49:21

this slide that she is an

49:23

issue. I

49:26

don't know which version is worse.

49:29

I'm like, is this just like a nineteen forties

49:32

things did did adult?

49:34

Wasn't the Hayes Code in action by

49:37

now?

49:37

Yeah?

49:38

Yeah? Why can you French kiss your

49:40

mom? I priorities

49:42

all over the place at this time, truly.

49:44

Yeah, they're like, we can't have

49:47

gay people on screen, but you can kiss your mother

49:49

on the lips.

49:50

And in fact, you should do it twice.

49:54

Okay, Next slide, drink

49:56

every time there's a random animal at the

49:58

Bailey building and.

49:59

Loan that's really I have something to say

50:01

about that.

50:02

Okay, later on, Yes, we see

50:05

a crow or something pictured here,

50:07

it's.

50:08

The raven but thank you, sorry,

50:11

that's my friend.

50:14

Next slide, please drink every time Uncle

50:16

Billy is horrible at his job.

50:19

This squirrel is so they okay, well

50:22

this squirrel. The

50:24

squirrel is like the

50:26

best actor in the movie, and the

50:28

squirrel is hitting their mark.

50:31

The second that Billy is sad. This

50:33

squirrel is like, like, it's really

50:35

exciting, and let's the next

50:38

slide please, it's just a close up.

50:40

Oh yeah, the squirrel. Okay,

50:42

we agree, Yeah,

50:45

okay, next slide and then

50:47

drink every time. Annie is the best character

50:49

in the movie.

50:51

Now.

50:51

Annie did not appear in the

50:54

recap because she's not relevant

50:56

to the plot at all, but she is

50:59

the best character. We will talk about her later.

51:01

Yes, that's the end of my drilling

51:04

game.

51:04

Okay,

51:09

okay. Contexts about

51:11

this movie. So, this movie

51:13

came out in nineteen forty six, just after

51:16

the end of World War Two. It is

51:18

directed by Frank Capra.

51:21

We'll talk about his whole history

51:23

because it's weird and complicated.

51:25

But this was a movie that was

51:27

adapted from a short story called

51:29

The Greatest Gift. The Greatest

51:31

Gift was published in nineteen thirty nine. There

51:34

were a lot of writers that worked on

51:36

this movie because it went through a lot of rounds

51:38

of casting and basically like every

51:41

famous old Hollywood person was

51:44

considered for every role, but it went

51:46

to Jimmy Stewart. It feels right for

51:48

Jimmy Stewart, whether you like him or not, like it

51:50

feels like a very classically Jimmy Stewart role.

51:53

But I think what's interesting about

51:55

it is that a lot of the

51:57

writers for this movie were

52:00

later accused of being communists.

52:03

Awesome, but

52:06

there were a lot of leftist writers associated

52:08

with the production of this movie, although

52:11

none of them were finally credited. The

52:13

final credits on this movie credit

52:15

the screenplay to Francis Goodrich, Albert

52:17

Hackett, and Frank Capra,

52:20

with some work from Joe Swirling. The two

52:22

leftists that worked on this movie were Dorothy

52:25

Parker and Dalton Trumbo,

52:27

who is like, you know, one of the one of the one

52:29

of the big ones that makes a movie about

52:31

him. Yeah, and it sucked. I

52:34

didn't see it, and that's too bad. It's

52:37

for free on Rogu TV and

52:40

they played Twinkle a Little stuff

52:43

the whole time. What's interesting

52:45

to me about that because this

52:47

movie flopped when it came

52:49

out in forty six and

52:52

I.

52:52

Know you do you have, yes, I have

52:54

some information about that. Yeah, a box office

52:57

failure in the sense that it needed to

53:00

earn twice the production costs,

53:02

and it only earned about the same

53:04

amount that it costs to produce

53:06

and make the movie. So It was

53:09

considered a flop, so much so that

53:11

when the copyright of this movie lapsed

53:14

in nineteen seventy four, everyone

53:17

was like, no one liked that movie, no one went

53:19

to go see it, and so we're not even gonna

53:21

bother to renew the copyright, which

53:23

means it fell into the public domain, which

53:26

allowed TV stations

53:28

TV networks to broadcast

53:30

it basically for free. They didn't

53:33

have to pay any licensing or royalties

53:35

on it, which is why it was broadcast

53:37

so relentlessly.

53:41

Yeah, like decades and like in every Christmas

53:43

Eve? Was it like broadcasts

53:46

or something like that.

53:47

I use something like that. There's an Adam

53:49

Ruins everything about this if you want

53:51

to look that up. All this to

53:53

say it was a box office failure.

53:56

Which is interesting because it got

53:58

like a fair amount of attention outside

54:00

of people who went to see it, which was

54:02

not too many people. There's all

54:04

these stories about how this movie got famous

54:07

so long after it came out that some

54:09

of the child actors who played Jimmy Stewart's

54:12

kids, Jimmy Stewart and Donna

54:14

Reid, because she will be a raised throughout this movie.

54:17

There are kids like didn't even see it. Until

54:19

it came out on TV, so

54:22

it didn't become like really popular until

54:24

yeah, the seventies, eighties, nineties.

54:26

Ye.

54:26

But at the time when it came out, it

54:28

was interrogated by the

54:30

FBI for espousing

54:33

communist values, which

54:36

is, you know, Jaedgar

54:38

Hoover is gonna Jadgar Hoover, right.

54:41

But there's this

54:43

is I found a piece from

54:46

Tribune magazine by Reese Hadley

54:48

and that was published in twenty

54:50

twenty one that sort of unpacks the ways.

54:52

There's a whole FBI file for

54:55

It's a Wonderful Life for

54:57

being too Communists, and the

55:00

reasons that they lay out are very interesting.

55:02

The first one is that

55:05

the quote values or institutions

55:07

judge to be particularly anti American

55:10

or pro communist interesting are

55:13

glorified in a movie examples

55:15

failure, depravity,

55:19

the common man, the

55:22

collective, and

55:24

the FBI hate that we can't be having

55:26

that in a movie.

55:27

Horrible.

55:28

Another reason the FBI had

55:31

an issue with this movie. They argued

55:34

that the movie may have portrayed mister Potter

55:36

as quote following the rules

55:38

as laid down by the state bank

55:40

examiners in connection with making loans.

55:45

I didn't even understand that sentence,

55:48

the.

55:48

FBI was like, what's wrong with predatory

55:51

loans? Oh?

55:54

Okay, that's what this country was

55:56

built on.

55:56

It, It's true, okay. And

55:59

then finally the FBI said

56:02

that It's a Wonderful Life is a problem because

56:04

it espoused quote values

56:06

or institutions judged to be particularly

56:08

American are smeared or presented

56:11

as evil in a movie. Examples

56:13

the free enterprise system, industrialist

56:17

wealth, the profit

56:19

motive, success, the

56:22

independent man. Wow,

56:25

And that like speaks to basically everything

56:27

I like about this very same

56:30

is that is and I know we'll talk

56:32

about it, but like the whole the

56:34

message of this movie that I like is

56:38

encouraging people to work

56:41

in favor of their collective versus

56:43

the individual, which I think is really cool and like

56:45

not something you see often, especially in

56:47

American movies. But

56:49

it's it's interesting that this

56:52

movie specifically was taken down

56:54

for being potentially communist because

56:57

both Jimmy Stewart and Frank

56:59

Capra were lifelong Republicans,

57:03

hugely Jimmy Stewart

57:05

had just I mean, Jimmy Stewart

57:08

served in World War Two and

57:10

wasn't sure if he was going to come back to a movie

57:12

career and Frank

57:14

Capra, who has

57:16

a very very interesting background.

57:19

He immigrated from Italy when he was very young.

57:21

He worked his way up in the movie industry

57:24

and then just kind of got America

57:27

killed in the way unfortunately

57:30

people do. And

57:32

even though his movies were most popular

57:34

during the Roosevelt era and

57:36

are very associated with that era,

57:39

he was a lifelong Republican to the point where he

57:42

skewed fascistic where he

57:45

was, you know, he worked with Dalton

57:47

Trumbo, but he was also like, what

57:49

about this Mussolini guy, seems like he has

57:52

some good ideas. I'm

57:55

truly like, I'm not being I'm

57:58

not you know, it's interesting

58:01

he came like his most famous movies

58:03

I think would be it Happened one Night, mister

58:05

Smith goes to Washington, also with Jimmy Stewart

58:08

and this movie. And

58:10

in spite of you

58:13

know, he came to the US as

58:15

an immigrant and then he kind of became

58:18

a nationalist over time, as

58:20

did Jimmy Stewart. And so the main two

58:22

creative voices in this movie

58:25

are very far from communists.

58:28

And I mean that as an insult, but

58:32

it's just like this weird back and forth because

58:35

I like that FBI File

58:37

a lot because they're like, why is this movie awesome?

58:39

Let's kill them.

58:42

It's just like a weird kind of

58:44

web because it's like you, I think that

58:47

the FBI File is very funny and

58:49

that those values are very clear

58:51

in the movie. But then the fact that the director

58:54

has praised Mussolini, just like,

58:56

what do we do in this? But that

58:59

I guess from what I've gathered, And

59:01

I'm not a Frank Capra expert

59:03

by any means, but that Frank Capra,

59:06

who skewed pretty right, I

59:09

mean Mussolini, Yeah,

59:12

would most often collaborate

59:14

with leftist writers and

59:17

they would end up with this fucking weirdo

59:20

in between ay things that I feel like is clear and it's

59:22

a wonderful life.

59:23

Yeah. Number one, I

59:26

hate Jimmy Stewart even more now I

59:28

did not know that he was a Republican. Number

59:31

two. So one of the credited

59:33

writers, Francis Goodrich,

59:35

who is a woman nor

59:38

oh gosh.

59:40

She worked on a

59:43

draft of this script with her

59:45

husband Albert Hackett,

59:48

another credited writer, but

59:50

there was a pretty big dispute between them and

59:52

Frank Capra. So Francis

59:54

Goodrich is quoted as calling

59:57

Capra a horrid man

1:00:00

and a very arrogant son

1:00:02

of a bitch. So we

1:00:04

love to see it.

1:00:05

We love to see pro Misolini

1:00:08

people characterized

1:00:11

that way. So that's the background.

1:00:13

Yeah for the movie. Should we

1:00:15

start by talking about miss Mary

1:00:17

Bailey?

1:00:18

Let's do it? Okay, So

1:00:21

what do we know about her?

1:00:23

Well, it's a short list.

1:00:25

Yeah,

1:00:27

we know that she is

1:00:30

his wife. We know that she

1:00:32

has loved George Bailey ever since she was

1:00:34

a child for what reasons,

1:00:38

I don't know. She is a talented

1:00:40

artist and interior

1:00:43

decorator.

1:00:44

Okay.

1:00:44

This is something that like I think is really

1:00:47

I mean, so much of Mary

1:00:50

Bailey's story is erased

1:00:53

in this in spite of the fact that she does

1:00:56

have like a pretty significant like she goes

1:00:58

through a lot, but you just don't see any

1:01:00

of it, including she goes through

1:01:02

a full extreme home makeover

1:01:06

of this busted ass house that

1:01:08

she's like, we are reclaiming this house that

1:01:11

is broken and we are a part of the problem

1:01:13

because we were throwing rocks at it, and

1:01:16

she fixes the entire house over the course of years.

1:01:18

She does like what happens on ABC

1:01:21

every week night, and

1:01:24

we don't see any of it. I mean, because I feel like the

1:01:26

labor that Mary does is assumed

1:01:29

that this is just what a woman does,

1:01:31

and so it goes unseen and

1:01:34

praised, unacknowledged. But

1:01:36

she's doing a fucking lot.

1:01:39

She's doing a lot. But the main thing we know about

1:01:42

that, as far as like fixing up the house, is that George

1:01:44

is really ungrateful about it, because he's screams

1:01:47

and has a whole monologue about how he hates

1:01:49

this house and it's cold and drafty

1:01:51

and all of that.

1:01:53

Well, she didn't. I Well, that's the other

1:01:55

thing, because Mary, as

1:01:57

far as we know, like Mary, they

1:02:00

grow up together. I think she's the age

1:02:02

of Harry, his younger brother, so she's like

1:02:04

about four years younger than him, which

1:02:06

is very confusing when he's forty

1:02:09

and she's twenty three, and you're

1:02:11

like, I don't know, is

1:02:13

this okay?

1:02:15

No?

1:02:16

But you know, like she she goes

1:02:18

to college in I think New York.

1:02:21

Ever heard of it?

1:02:23

She has a whole sex in the City era. Yeah,

1:02:28

and we don't hear about fucking any of it. We don't

1:02:30

know what she majored in. And we

1:02:32

only know because I feel like the character of

1:02:34

Mary in a way that I find frustrating

1:02:36

because I like her, but she

1:02:39

ultimately always comes down to these

1:02:42

very like American white

1:02:44

feminine values of the

1:02:46

post war era, which is like, Okay,

1:02:48

you had your moment, you got

1:02:51

to get some education, you

1:02:53

got to run the USO for a little bit,

1:02:55

and now you know it should be your priority

1:02:58

to settle down to.

1:02:59

Be a wife and a mother.

1:03:01

And that's right. And we don't know about her ambitions

1:03:03

beyond that, right.

1:03:05

So yeah, I feel like she's done a

1:03:07

very big disservice by

1:03:10

the narrative and also by

1:03:13

the character of George Bailey.

1:03:16

I would like to wait, wait, wait, m

1:03:18

M. I want to talk about an important

1:03:20

character, Billy Brick.

1:03:22

Okay, because I just.

1:03:23

Was like ranking the most important characters to me

1:03:25

that I wanted to talk about versus Mary. The

1:03:28

second was the

1:03:30

Crow. Oh

1:03:33

do you know about the Crow? Okay, Okay,

1:03:36

you guys, I have a slideshow

1:03:39

presentation I

1:03:41

would like to do. It's about

1:03:43

Jimmy the Raven if we can get him

1:03:45

up. Bokay, wow,

1:03:51

Jimmy the Raven feminist ally

1:03:54

or agent of patriarchy.

1:03:57

Now, Caitlin, let's start

1:03:59

it like a by cast episode. What was

1:04:01

your experience with Jimmy the Raven.

1:04:05

I had never seen him before.

1:04:08

Oh yousilly

1:04:11

podcast host Jimmy

1:04:14

the Raven is the most famous movie bird

1:04:16

of all time. I

1:04:18

also didn't know this before three days

1:04:20

ago. But no,

1:04:23

Jimmy the Raven is very famous movie bird.

1:04:26

One of his most famous, but not even

1:04:29

his most famous appearance is

1:04:31

in It's a Wonderful Life. Let's go to the next

1:04:33

slide. We see here Vincent

1:04:36

Price with Jimmy and

1:04:38

a movie that he is co starring in. It's

1:04:42

called The Raven.

1:04:43

Wow.

1:04:44

Uh, he's an icon. He's a legend.

1:04:47

Did you know that ravens lived thirty

1:04:49

years? Because I didn't. His movie

1:04:52

career spanned eighteen years. So

1:04:55

whoa, here's the Okay, someone's

1:04:57

laughing at the lifespan of a raven. It's

1:05:00

not funny.

1:05:03

Here's the thing about Jimmy. Okay. So, Jimmy

1:05:06

was born in the Mojave Desert in

1:05:09

the nineteen thirties. He was

1:05:11

found by a

1:05:14

cowboy named Curly

1:05:16

Twyford.

1:05:17

Because of course he was.

1:05:20

Now, don't laugh at the name Curly Twyford.

1:05:24

He was found by a cowboy named

1:05:27

Curly Twyford, who

1:05:29

was a world War one veteran who decided

1:05:31

that he was going to make

1:05:34

Jimmy a star. Uh

1:05:36

huh. Interestingly this

1:05:39

worked. You wouldn't

1:05:41

expect it, and I was really spread.

1:05:43

I did not know about Jimmy the

1:05:45

Raven. And I say this as a big

1:05:47

fan of famous birds.

1:05:50

If you get to the next side, my favorite famous

1:05:52

bird is Andy the Goose, who

1:05:56

he's wearing shoes. You'll notice, Yeah,

1:05:59

he was a actually known as Andy de Goose

1:06:01

with no feet, but then this

1:06:03

guy put shoes on him and he

1:06:06

was Okay. If you go to the next slide,

1:06:08

there's me with Andy de Goose. I

1:06:11

drove to Nebraska a couple of years ago

1:06:14

to go visit his grave site.

1:06:17

Andy the Goose. At the time, he was a real icon

1:06:20

in the eighties. If you go to the next slide,

1:06:23

there he is riding a bike. He

1:06:26

was really special. And then unfortunately,

1:06:28

next slide he was murdered.

1:06:31

Oh my god.

1:06:33

And you can google that on your own time.

1:06:35

Next slide, back to Jimmy

1:06:37

the Raven. I

1:06:41

just want to plant Andy the Goose

1:06:43

in your mind because he's

1:06:45

a fascinating cultural figure. But we're

1:06:47

talking about Jimmy the Raven today. He

1:06:50

was a star, and he was a star from the beginning.

1:06:52

Next slide, here's a news clip jim

1:06:55

the Raven, a new flicker Hollywood.

1:06:59

One of the hottest stars and pictures is

1:07:01

a quaint character named Jim. He is

1:07:03

only twenty two but has a life expectancy

1:07:05

of one hundred and forty years. Not true?

1:07:07

What thirty?

1:07:11

Jim, who has stolen every movie scene

1:07:13

in which he has appeared, is a raven and

1:07:16

boys are true. But is

1:07:18

Jimmy the Raven a feminist?

1:07:21

That's the question I wanted to ask.

1:07:23

He's had a really intense

1:07:26

career, you know. Here we have the next

1:07:28

slide, is he was in The Wizard of Oz.

1:07:31

Yeah, playing, you know, a star turning

1:07:34

part as a crow when in fact he is

1:07:36

a raven.

1:07:37

Right.

1:07:38

The next slide, Betty Davis,

1:07:41

they're about to fuck. I

1:07:44

don't know if that's obvious, but to

1:07:47

me it's obvious. Next slide

1:07:50

him and Vincent Price and he's

1:07:52

drinking wine

1:07:54

and cheers to that. The

1:07:56

next one, the scariest side of all, in

1:08:00

which he is wearing a little

1:08:03

soldier's uniform. And

1:08:06

then there's one. There's one more. It's him and Curly

1:08:08

twy Ford and

1:08:11

Jimmy witnessed the birth of Curly

1:08:14

Twyford's baby. He

1:08:17

became a part of the family.

1:08:20

Okay, we're just gonna sort of go

1:08:22

through the next few because there's just so many

1:08:24

pictures of Jimmy. Okay, the next one,

1:08:26

and the next one that's him on TV he's

1:08:29

wearing a suit, and

1:08:32

then the next one, Okay, that's him

1:08:34

and Jimmy Cagney. Finally,

1:08:36

I want to go to the next slide, because

1:08:39

when the question came down to is Jimmy

1:08:41

the Raven a feminist? I

1:08:44

was looking into his personal history

1:08:48

and he's problematic.

1:08:52

Oh no, so

1:08:54

I know, like Mussolini is

1:08:57

awesome, not that far. He wasn't

1:08:59

frank, but

1:09:01

he was a problematic guy.

1:09:05

You know. Jimmy, he was a very trained actor.

1:09:07

He could do things like opening mail, operating

1:09:10

a typewriter, letting a cigarette,

1:09:12

flipping magazine pages, and dealing

1:09:15

a hand of poker. Okay,

1:09:18

Jimmy Stewart, Okay, this was kind

1:09:20

of fun. Okay. In on the

1:09:22

set of It's a Wonderful Life, Jimmy Stewart

1:09:25

could not be called Jimmy because

1:09:27

Jimmy the Raven would respond. So

1:09:31

he's also a bit of a diva.

1:09:34

He's the first Jimmy in the college sheet.

1:09:36

Wow.

1:09:38

I love Jimmy the Ravens so much. He

1:09:40

was insured for ten thousand dollars

1:09:43

by the Red Cross question mark.

1:09:45

We don't know why. He got a

1:09:48

Presidential Medal of Honor. Also don't know

1:09:50

why.

1:09:52

Oh

1:09:54

and and people like people talked

1:09:57

about Jimmy in ways that we're

1:09:59

not always mind.

1:10:01

Curly Twyford, for for example,

1:10:03

his father explained

1:10:07

that Jimmy had no fewer

1:10:10

than twenty one stand ins, most

1:10:13

of whom were women Ravens,

1:10:16

and it has been speculated

1:10:18

since that maybe Jimmy

1:10:21

was a woman and that there was gender

1:10:24

confusion. There were there was uh, you know,

1:10:27

we don't know because Jimmy's

1:10:29

been dead for a hundred years. But

1:10:32

Curly Twyford said, do

1:10:34

you guys like this there? Curly

1:10:38

Twyford said, I

1:10:44

was like in my bed making this, I'm like, well,

1:10:46

people play. I

1:10:48

think it's interesting. Okay. Curly

1:10:51

Twyford, who plumped Jimmy's

1:10:53

egg from the Mojave Desert, said

1:10:56

Jimmy is a great egotist. He

1:10:59

likes variety, and what

1:11:02

he means when he says that is that Jimmy would have a

1:11:04

different woman delivered to his cage

1:11:06

every day,

1:11:09

and that Jimmy was insatiable sexually.

1:11:12

I'm sorry, when you say a woman, are you talking

1:11:14

about a female raven or

1:11:16

you talking about

1:11:21

well when you say woman.

1:11:23

Betty Davis, did you go to his

1:11:25

cage?

1:11:27

I know that human women don't

1:11:29

have probably I hope don't

1:11:32

have.

1:11:32

You don't know.

1:11:35

The use of the word woman when

1:11:37

referring to female ravens was

1:11:40

just confusing.

1:11:42

Jimmy needed a different woman

1:11:44

in his cage every day. I mean,

1:11:46

he was an polyamorous king, exactly,

1:11:50

exactly. Maybe he was simply ahead of his time,

1:11:52

but at the time he was referred to as an egotist

1:11:55

in a diva.

1:11:58

He also wouldn't eat meat strips

1:12:00

delivered to him after he'd been in movies for a while

1:12:02

because again because they said he was going to live for one

1:12:04

hundred and forty years. They're like, Jimmy was in

1:12:07

over a thousand movies. He was in thirty,

1:12:10

okay, but including The Wizard

1:12:12

of Oz and It's a wonderful life. So a great

1:12:14

career. Nonetheless, not meaning

1:12:16

to cut down Jimmy, but by the end

1:12:18

of his career, when he was very, very successful.

1:12:20

He wouldn't eat strips of meat that were delivered

1:12:23

to him unless they'd been sprinkled with sugar.

1:12:26

Wow.

1:12:27

And one of his human co stars

1:12:30

said, I'm disenchanted by him.

1:12:35

I think he's got a star complex.

1:12:38

Wow. Jimmy

1:12:41

Stewart said, the Raven is the smartest actor

1:12:43

on set. They don't have to do as many takes

1:12:45

for him as the rest of us, so

1:12:48

he's also kind of a genius. He's the

1:12:50

Daniel dan Lewis of birds. Frank

1:12:54

Capra was especially a fan, and as

1:12:57

we don't like Frank Capra, however,

1:13:00

Jimmy was basically like Scorsese,

1:13:02

de Niro, Frank Capra, Jimmy

1:13:04

the Raven. Okay, he's in all

1:13:06

of his movies. It's really

1:13:09

bizarre. Ultimately,

1:13:11

with Jimmy, I was like, is Jimmy

1:13:13

a feminist? You know? It was unclear

1:13:15

given the information I had, Okay,

1:13:19

and I'll tell you I was not able

1:13:21

to figure it out. However, the

1:13:24

Raven you see in this scene, that

1:13:27

is not Jimmy the Raven.

1:13:29

Oh scandal, That is Coco

1:13:32

the Raven. Who's that one

1:13:34

of Jimmy's stand ins, Caitlin of course?

1:13:37

Oh my goodness.

1:13:38

And so I found this blog from

1:13:40

two thousand and nine brag that

1:13:43

is strictly around character actors

1:13:45

that have been forgotten, called the Unsung Joe,

1:13:47

that explains who Coco

1:13:50

the Raven is. I'm gonna

1:13:52

quote from it. And

1:13:54

then there was Coco. More

1:13:57

than a stand in, less than a performer. Coco

1:14:00

was a slightly older but less versatile

1:14:02

bird who deputized for Jimmy

1:14:05

in those scenes that called for the presence of a

1:14:07

raven, but not for any of the tricks which

1:14:09

Jimmy alone was capable of. The

1:14:12

only drawback that arose

1:14:15

from the lack of activity in Coco's

1:14:17

job was a susceptibility for

1:14:19

that old actor's complaint cleague

1:14:22

eyes. I didn't know about that

1:14:24

old actor's complaint. I'll tell you

1:14:26

what it is. Coco would find himself

1:14:29

fascinated by the huge, bright studio

1:14:31

lights and would stare into

1:14:34

them, hypnotized until

1:14:37

his eyes became inflamed, turning

1:14:41

from their inky black to a dark green,

1:14:44

whereupon he would become distressed

1:14:46

and curly. Twyford would have to remove

1:14:48

him from the set. He never learned,

1:14:50

though he loved those lights.

1:14:55

I love Coco, and I think There's

1:14:57

an important scene in the next line where

1:14:59

Coco is present, and

1:15:01

it's the scene in which

1:15:03

Uncle Billy is once again banned his job

1:15:06

and there is a raven on the desk. This is

1:15:09

not Jimmy the Raven, and don't credit him as

1:15:11

such. That is Coco the Raven,

1:15:13

because Coco the Raven was good at one thing,

1:15:15

and that was standing still. So

1:15:18

in conclusion, was Jimmy

1:15:21

the Raven and Ally? And I know you were all wondering

1:15:23

that when you walked in. The answer is final

1:15:26

slide, Jimmy a bitch, Justice

1:15:28

for Coco.

1:15:33

Okay, that's all I have to say for

1:15:36

the show. But if you have anything else to say,

1:15:38

feel free. No

1:15:40

I think that I've been working on this for seven

1:15:42

months.

1:15:45

Uh yeah, no, I just have a few

1:15:47

more things to say. We

1:15:51

are running out of time, but I'll

1:15:53

you know, I'll go through.

1:15:54

I wouldn't that take twenty five minutes.

1:15:58

Look, I have a section called George Bailey

1:16:00

and his Crimes. Allow me starting

1:16:04

with exhibit A the robe

1:16:07

scene. Yes, yes, exactly.

1:16:10

So, just to recap

1:16:12

this a little further, this is the scene

1:16:15

where George and Mary are walking

1:16:17

around after the party they had fallen

1:16:19

into the pool. So they put on other

1:16:21

clothes and Mary put on a

1:16:24

robe and she's presumably naked

1:16:27

underneath. They're walking around, they're

1:16:29

flirting. There's a guy in the neighborhood who

1:16:31

is yelling at George and being like kiss

1:16:34

her, and George is like,

1:16:36

fine, I'll kiss her so freaking hard,

1:16:40

and then Mary runs away

1:16:42

at that, but George was standing

1:16:44

on her robe, so it falls off

1:16:46

as she runs away, and now she's naked,

1:16:49

so she hides in the bushes. When

1:16:51

George realizes this and realizes

1:16:54

that he can exploit this situation,

1:16:57

he absolutely.

1:16:58

Does immediately until he finds

1:17:00

out his father died.

1:17:02

That's right, because he's like, She's

1:17:05

like, please, I beg you give me my

1:17:07

robe back, and he's like no.

1:17:10

She asks him so many times he refuses.

1:17:13

She says she's going to tell his

1:17:15

mother and tell the police

1:17:18

parentheses acab.

1:17:20

Well, then he says, you know, I think the

1:17:22

police would be on my side, and you're like, that's kind

1:17:24

of an a cab line because they probably would.

1:17:26

It would be yes, unfortunately, But

1:17:29

the point is she is like feeling

1:17:31

very vulnerable and naked,

1:17:33

and he's like, I'm gonna just like tease

1:17:35

you and exploit this situation in a

1:17:38

very cruel awful way.

1:17:39

Well, I think that that the two

1:17:42

pivotal moments in

1:17:45

their early relationship are defined

1:17:47

by that dynamic. Right where

1:17:50

when they're kids, you can

1:17:53

almost write it away by the fact that Mary

1:17:55

leans over he says, George, you

1:17:58

know, but

1:18:01

we know because he cannot hear out of that.

1:18:02

Ear, he cannot hear her.

1:18:05

And so when he comes up and says I'm gonna have

1:18:07

a harem, he's just being weird and

1:18:10

he's not, you know, being necessarily

1:18:13

antagonistic. But that scene that you're describing

1:18:15

where he is actively taking advantage

1:18:17

of power over but then also

1:18:20

in the scene immediately before cut to them

1:18:22

getting married, I think that dynamic

1:18:24

is equally present. Like Mary's

1:18:26

agency is cut out of this

1:18:28

narrative at every possible opportunity.

1:18:31

It's cut up by the fact that she's hiding

1:18:33

in a bush naked.

1:18:36

It's cut out by the fact that her mother is

1:18:38

watching, her boyfriend is on the phone, and

1:18:40

George has her in his hand.

1:18:44

Yeah, I've broken down that scene

1:18:46

as well, where so he

1:18:49

I don't know why he's in a bad mood, he's just

1:18:51

kind of a bad guy. Sorry, but

1:18:54

he's like, you know, lumbering

1:18:56

around all pissed off, and he clearly

1:18:58

deliberately goes over to Mary's house

1:19:01

to try to run into her, but he

1:19:03

acts like he was just passing by. Well.

1:19:06

He also makes it very clear that

1:19:08

she was not his first choice

1:19:10

because he tries to hook up with her friend,

1:19:13

but then gets annoyed when her friend doesn't

1:19:15

want to climb a mountain.

1:19:16

Right yeah, So he's

1:19:18

like, oh, I guess a.

1:19:19

Little okay girl who's not gonna

1:19:21

climb a mountain.

1:19:23

You're like, okay, So and he

1:19:25

goes over to Mary.

1:19:26

Got a bumble, I can't and

1:19:28

he keeps, well, Jamie, this was pre

1:19:30

bumble, just like it was pre venmo. Nothing

1:19:33

to come in.

1:19:35

So he goes over to Mary's house and he keeps being

1:19:37

like, I don't even know why I'm here. I wasn't

1:19:39

even planning to come here, even

1:19:42

though like it was very a very deliberate

1:19:44

choice on his part. Mary is trying

1:19:46

to give him a warm welcome. She like

1:19:49

displays the little drawing she made

1:19:51

for him. He doesn't like notice

1:19:54

or appreciate anything that she has done.

1:19:57

He spends the whole interaction just like feeling

1:19:59

very so for himself and being a complete

1:20:01

asshole. Then he's jealous that

1:20:03

that other guy, Sam calls

1:20:06

and is like interested in Mary, so he storms

1:20:08

out. He comes back in Sam

1:20:11

is like what about plastics? And

1:20:13

then George throws

1:20:15

a fit. He grabs Mary. He says,

1:20:18

I don't care about plastics and

1:20:20

I don't want to get married to anyone ever. Do

1:20:22

you understand that smash cut

1:20:24

to them getting married, So that's

1:20:27

Bill, and then.

1:20:28

He also like there is a

1:20:30

forcible kiss because she's crying.

1:20:33

She's crying, she's crying of

1:20:35

how mean he's being.

1:20:37

I just I yeah, I mean I there comes

1:20:39

a point in that dynamic where I

1:20:41

don't even understand what's going

1:20:43

on, because with Mary it does. It's

1:20:45

just like her agency is always

1:20:48

undercut by at least one

1:20:50

person in the scene, but often multiple

1:20:53

people. In this scene, the scene right

1:20:55

before they get married, you know, it's

1:20:57

it is clear that Mary is interested

1:20:59

in George, but he's only terrible

1:21:02

to her. In that same scene,

1:21:04

we know that she's gone to college, but we are not

1:21:06

allowed to know anything other than the

1:21:08

thing that I've seen repeatedly written about with

1:21:11

Mary and how I feel like her character

1:21:13

plays out, is that like, Okay,

1:21:15

fine, she went to college, she's a modern

1:21:18

woman, but ultimately she just wants

1:21:20

to be a mother in her hometown, which

1:21:23

is not an inherently bad thing, but I

1:21:25

feel like it was reinforcing what the

1:21:27

encouraged norm was at that time

1:21:30

for a woman who had education, especially

1:21:32

you know, coming out of World

1:21:34

War Two, where women for

1:21:36

the first time had just been encouraged to

1:21:39

be working and encouraged to be out

1:21:41

there. And it because this movie

1:21:44

coming out in nineteen forty six feels really prescient

1:21:46

because it's like, Okay, let's reel

1:21:48

it in, you know, like know your

1:21:51

role. And I feel like the way that

1:21:53

that white womanhood specifically moved

1:21:56

ahead with Donna Reed sort

1:21:58

of at the helm the nineteen

1:22:00

fifties. And that's not even a slight

1:22:03

to Donna Reed, because it's not her fault,

1:22:05

but her show, I feel

1:22:07

like, is the most commonly cited in

1:22:10

terms of like what a white housewife

1:22:12

was perceived as being in the nineteen

1:22:14

fifties, in spite of the fact that behind the scenes she

1:22:16

was producing her own show and doing all

1:22:19

of these things that were not encouraged

1:22:21

for women to do. To perpetuate this

1:22:23

view, it's just I don't

1:22:25

know, it's really it's really really frustrating,

1:22:27

especially because at the end

1:22:30

of the movie, it's Mary

1:22:33

who pulls the community together

1:22:36

to give George this experience

1:22:38

that makes him want to live again.

1:22:41

And so we have this whole sequence with Clarence

1:22:43

that is impactful. It's very

1:22:46

well staged, you know, Like I don't want to take

1:22:48

that away from fans of the movie, but everything

1:22:51

that happens off screen is Mary

1:22:53

and his family pulling together

1:22:55

the community to reward

1:22:58

you with the final shot

1:23:00

of the movie, right, Mary does all of

1:23:02

that, and I feel like that really goes underappreciated

1:23:06

and under examined. But she did all that

1:23:08

shit. She did so much. I mean, she like renovated

1:23:11

a mansion.

1:23:12

And he is so ungrateful about it, he hates

1:23:15

it.

1:23:15

And then she's she like pulls him

1:23:17

off the edge. And that is also unacknowledged

1:23:20

by the plot. It's made to seem like, well, Clarence

1:23:22

got his wings and that's why George, you

1:23:25

know, believes in life again. But it's like

1:23:27

Mary did all the fucking organizing

1:23:30

to make this happen, and she's cut

1:23:32

out of so many scenes earlier where it like,

1:23:34

I feel like it's always presented as or

1:23:37

it's most commonly presented in the movie as

1:23:39

like George gave away all

1:23:41

of his money to the community

1:23:44

from his wedding and that's

1:23:46

all him, him, him, and it's like that's

1:23:49

Mary's money as well. Yeah, And

1:23:51

she is not invited into those scenes.

1:23:54

She's not and I think those scenes would be improved

1:23:56

by her presence, and she's like not even

1:23:58

welcome until the end where George

1:24:01

is like, oh, where the fuck is Mary at? And

1:24:04

you're like, you left her outside? Man?

1:24:06

You know, yeah, I don't know.

1:24:08

Yeah. And then there's like there's two other scenes

1:24:11

where George in a pretty major way,

1:24:13

is being extremely cruel to

1:24:16

a loved one. There's the scene where he's

1:24:18

like screaming at Uncle Billy after he's

1:24:20

lost the money, and then there's the Christmas

1:24:22

Eve scene where George

1:24:24

comes home after the money has been lost and

1:24:27

he is just being

1:24:29

extremely cruel to his wife

1:24:31

and his children, and then he

1:24:33

storms out. So when

1:24:36

George Bailey is being pleasant

1:24:39

in the movie, which does happen occasionally,

1:24:41

it's almost always to his customers.

1:24:44

When he's being awful, it's almost always

1:24:47

to his family

1:24:49

member or to mister Potter. So he basically

1:24:52

treats his family the same

1:24:54

way he treats the villain of the.

1:24:56

Movie, which I don't like. And it's

1:24:58

because like the closest I can

1:25:00

get to playing Devil's advocate, there is like the

1:25:02

way that George's life is shown is so

1:25:05

inconsistent that you see

1:25:07

him at his worst a

1:25:09

lot, yea, and so he does

1:25:11

not come off well as like, I

1:25:14

don't understand why people are like

1:25:16

this guy's awesome. We're like, well, I've seen him

1:25:18

yelling as much as I've seen him being nice,

1:25:21

Right, I don't know. I mean the

1:25:23

things that I know, we are

1:25:25

running out of time. The

1:25:28

things that I think this movie does

1:25:31

very well, or at least

1:25:33

very well for nineteen forty six

1:25:35

is the commentary on collectiveness

1:25:39

and on individualism,

1:25:42

like American individualism, which is something that is

1:25:44

very very much pushed to this

1:25:46

day, to our detriment to

1:25:49

working towards the collective. I think that

1:25:51

like part of what makes this movie work

1:25:54

for me, in spite of its many,

1:25:56

many many flaws, down to Capra being

1:25:59

like Mussolini. What we think is

1:26:03

the core idea of you

1:26:06

know, the American dream is inherently

1:26:09

rarely achievable, and

1:26:12

George's life is not valueless

1:26:14

because he spent it making sacrifices

1:26:18

for his community. I

1:26:20

think that's a really beautiful idea.

1:26:22

It's a complicated idea, and we could talk

1:26:24

about it more. I mean the scenes. I literally

1:26:26

broke down my George discussion into

1:26:28

like scenes I liked Georgian

1:26:31

versus scenes I don't ye

1:26:33

scenes I don't most of them

1:26:35

with his wife he

1:26:38

goes out of the way to like beret female

1:26:41

teacher on the phone, Like, yes, he

1:26:43

clearly does not have a lot of respect for women, not

1:26:46

to mention that Mary is barely

1:26:48

characterized. And then the two mothers

1:26:51

we see in this movie, Mary's and George's.

1:26:53

Their only interest is husband, and

1:26:55

then our mad children getting married. That's all

1:26:58

the scenes I liked Georgian and were

1:27:00

the ones that were more politically

1:27:03

minded and so it like ultimately,

1:27:05

I was like, Wow, he's like very dsa

1:27:07

bro coded Yeah, like

1:27:10

where his politics are awesome, but

1:27:12

he hates women.

1:27:13

Some scenes

1:27:17

I.

1:27:17

Like Georgian and I say that as a

1:27:19

Doe's paying member. Okay,

1:27:23

no, but I'm right. And scenes

1:27:27

I like Georgian include when

1:27:29

he's a kid, and he defends his dad against

1:27:31

Potter. The scene where

1:27:35

he his I mean, like, he does make a

1:27:37

series of sacrifices in

1:27:39

order to hold some like

1:27:42

to sort of hold the line to prevent

1:27:44

capitalism from completely demolishing

1:27:46

his hometown. That is sort

1:27:49

of what he's doing throughout. And

1:27:51

there's a scene where he i mean early on where

1:27:53

he just fucking mows Potter

1:27:56

down and tells

1:27:58

him that he's treating people like

1:28:00

their cattle, and like,

1:28:02

I mean that that's really really powerful,

1:28:05

and as well as when he turns down Potter

1:28:08

for taking you know, the sellout

1:28:10

contract for like you could live

1:28:13

comfortably forever if you just shut

1:28:15

the fuck up about housing people

1:28:17

who don't have money, and like, I

1:28:20

think that that is like a really

1:28:22

cool, core minded thing. As well

1:28:24

as the fact that his community in the scenes

1:28:26

that we see them in are

1:28:29

also like of the same mind, where

1:28:31

when George is like, hey, you know, Potter

1:28:33

is gonna you know, he's offering you money

1:28:35

now, but he is buying you and

1:28:37

you will be fucked in the long term, and they listen

1:28:40

to each other and they collectively decide

1:28:42

we're not going to be okay with this, And then

1:28:44

at the end, they pay it forward to

1:28:47

George because of Mary, which no

1:28:49

one cares about. So I

1:28:51

think that like politically it's a really cool

1:28:54

movie and everything else

1:28:57

basically not as much.

1:29:00

Yes, I don't know why I did an evil laugh there,

1:29:02

but

1:29:05

anyway, so we

1:29:08

have to wrap up. There's more

1:29:10

to talk about, but you'll just have to listen to

1:29:12

the episode because we will just record

1:29:14

some pickups later. Yeah,

1:29:17

and here are those

1:29:19

pickups.

1:29:20

So look at us future us.

1:29:23

Wow.

1:29:24

I know it sounds. It reminds me of YouTubers

1:29:26

from like we should be. I guess we are

1:29:28

wearing you know, like when you're watching a YouTuber

1:29:30

and then they add in a note when they're

1:29:33

editing and they're wearing a hoodie and they're like, hey

1:29:35

future mom, me

1:29:38

here, And I just wanted to add

1:29:40

a note. It's what we're doing. That's nice.

1:29:42

Yes, no offense to YouTubers, but they

1:29:45

all do it anyways.

1:29:47

Okay, so just a few things

1:29:49

that we didn't have time for in the live

1:29:51

show, and so first

1:29:53

I just want to kind of we already

1:29:56

hinted at this a little bit and made a few references,

1:29:58

but just wanted to play little

1:30:00

more attention to the way

1:30:02

the movie frames his

1:30:04

community, his town, George's town,

1:30:06

you know, New Bedford, which actually

1:30:09

becomes Pottersville, right

1:30:11

if George had never existed,

1:30:13

and just sort of like the implications there,

1:30:16

Right, it's like, look how unsavory this

1:30:18

town is. I feel like Violet

1:30:21

is implied to be a

1:30:23

sex worker of some kind. Yeah,

1:30:26

did you get that sense too?

1:30:27

I did as well, or like in

1:30:30

as explicit a way that you

1:30:32

could at that time. Yeah, I noticed,

1:30:34

and this was something that was

1:30:37

supported in I guess like a

1:30:39

round table talk that I

1:30:42

encountered from Smithsonian magazine.

1:30:45

Ooh ever heard of it about?

1:30:47

Yeah, the implications of Pottersfield, because as we said

1:30:49

at the show, Pottersville seems like kind

1:30:51

of a good time for a weekend. But

1:30:53

I think, yeah, like the signifiers and

1:30:55

like speaking to the in

1:30:58

spite of you know, this movie very much having its

1:31:00

moments, there is like an element of rigid

1:31:03

like rigidity in terms of like

1:31:05

what is considered appropriate society

1:31:07

and what isn't. And it feels like this

1:31:10

that Pottersville is associating it with

1:31:13

sin capitalism. Well,

1:31:16

well, it's like TV is like two things where it's like explicitly

1:31:19

capitalistic, which I which is as close

1:31:21

as I could get to understanding. But

1:31:23

yeah, it's like sin meeting sex work

1:31:25

and jazz music, which seems like proximity

1:31:28

to blackness and like and that

1:31:31

is let me just pull

1:31:34

up the quote

1:31:36

I have here from this piece that was

1:31:38

compiled by Christopher

1:31:40

Wilson. Quote Capra's

1:31:42

hints at the degradation of the town come in the

1:31:44

form of the black music jazz heard

1:31:47

pouring out of the taverns in Diamond

1:31:49

dance halls. Higgins, one

1:31:51

of the roundtable participants, also

1:31:54

noted that Mary's fate as an old maid in

1:31:56

this alternative universe, portrayed as

1:31:58

hideous and sad, is presented as perfectly

1:32:00

fine, appropriate and desirable for

1:32:02

Annie in the real world. Unquote

1:32:05

right, It's a

1:32:07

world where things that are

1:32:10

completely normal and should be

1:32:12

socially accepted are presented as a dystopia,

1:32:14

which is a sex work and

1:32:17

jazz and being

1:32:19

a single woman over thirty and having

1:32:22

a nice time with your life exactly.

1:32:24

Yeah. So again with like Violet

1:32:27

implied, because I think you see her coming out

1:32:30

of a strip club or something that's implied

1:32:32

to be a strip club. It's just all very

1:32:34

sex worker shamey. It's

1:32:37

shamy of yeah, like unmarried

1:32:40

women, and of course, like that reflects

1:32:42

the values of the time. And

1:32:45

is it strange, you

1:32:47

know, to be applying a like twenty twenty

1:32:49

three lens to a nineteen forty

1:32:52

six movie. Sure, but

1:32:54

but I.

1:32:54

Feel like it's it's like I

1:32:58

get frustrated when, like in caunturing

1:33:00

that criticism of like, well, what did you expect it's

1:33:02

nineteen forty six. It's like, yeah, we're not saying we

1:33:04

expected better of nineteen forty six,

1:33:06

but it's like we're

1:33:09

having it's still I think the more relevant

1:33:11

discussion is it's still wildly popular

1:33:14

in twenty twenty three, and that's why

1:33:16

it's the relevant discussion.

1:33:18

You know, yeah, yeah, these archaic

1:33:20

and shamy and patriarchal values

1:33:23

haven't gone away, no, so and

1:33:26

you know they were perpetuated by movies

1:33:28

like this and reinforced by movies

1:33:31

like this, and those ideals

1:33:34

have lasted for.

1:33:35

Millennia, and so are the I

1:33:38

mean, I think we talked about this a fair amount

1:33:40

during the live show. But also

1:33:42

I think that the more the more,

1:33:44

like the cooler areas of

1:33:47

this movie, which is like the idea

1:33:49

of it being a life well

1:33:52

lived to work for

1:33:54

your community and serve your community

1:33:57

instead of working towards

1:33:59

individualistic and personal gained, which

1:34:01

is such an inherently American

1:34:04

value that the

1:34:06

bottom falls out of all

1:34:08

the fucking time. And that's

1:34:10

not to say I mean, I think that it's I

1:34:13

kind of like where it falls, because the

1:34:15

takeaway from George's

1:34:17

experience with Clarence is like the

1:34:20

best message that the movie has. Of course,

1:34:22

this is only a message

1:34:24

that is accessible by

1:34:26

a white guy, even though he's a

1:34:28

white guy that's suffering a lot

1:34:31

of poverty and personal distress.

1:34:33

Like that's I don't mean to discount

1:34:35

that, but you know that

1:34:37

the narrative is only accessible to him,

1:34:40

not Mary, who has

1:34:43

organized and made this all fucking possible.

1:34:45

He wouldn't have a damn roof over his head,

1:34:48

and he wouldn't have the money if it wasn't for Mary.

1:34:50

We know this, But I think that it

1:34:53

being important that George worked

1:34:56

for his community and served as community,

1:34:59

and that presenting it that

1:35:01

they're also like, it's not devaluing

1:35:04

his life as an individual, because

1:35:06

that's the whole clearance thing is

1:35:09

that like, you as an individual are an

1:35:11

important part of your community,

1:35:13

and without you very passively

1:35:16

over emphasizing George's importance.

1:35:19

But the message, the

1:35:21

message a lot, I think, right,

1:35:23

like, but the message feels relevant.

1:35:26

That's like one of the more I think that's my guess

1:35:28

of like why this movie is other

1:35:31

than just being you know, really pummeled

1:35:33

over the head. If you live in the US,

1:35:35

I understand why that message is still

1:35:37

really powerful, that like you, that

1:35:40

serving the collective is valuable,

1:35:42

and that you are a valuable part of that

1:35:44

collective.

1:35:45

That's beautiful, and that's fine if a

1:35:47

movie, you know, kind of like exaggerates

1:35:49

that. But the movie, like especially that section

1:35:53

it credits George for like saving

1:35:57

women, all the women in the town from

1:35:59

these quo unquote horrible fates

1:36:01

of you know, sex work and being

1:36:04

a quote unquote old maid who's a

1:36:06

librarian, who's so undesirable

1:36:09

because she wears glasst.

1:36:11

Like and that

1:36:13

also feels like I don't know. I

1:36:15

mean we've talked about this within period

1:36:18

pieces too, where like obviously we can't

1:36:20

apply a twenty twenty three lens to

1:36:24

nineteen forty six. But I think even so,

1:36:26

if like, if this movie had

1:36:29

any interest in Mary,

1:36:31

it could present her. I mean, I think it's very

1:36:34

like flat in the way that her

1:36:36

being a quote unquote old maid and wearing Warby

1:36:38

Parker glasses is presented

1:36:40

where it's like the value of the movie is

1:36:42

that happening to you is bad, Whereas

1:36:45

I think there's a way to present it of like, that's

1:36:48

what happens to her, that's her

1:36:50

life, that's her choice. She's happy with

1:36:52

it, but society isn't happy with her,

1:36:55

you know. And I think that there's a way to present a

1:36:58

historical reality of

1:37:01

the mid twentieth century, which is that, you

1:37:03

know, especially post World War Two, it totally

1:37:05

makes sense we're like heading towards

1:37:08

one of the most sort of rigid housewife

1:37:10

eras in the US. It

1:37:12

makes sense that you would be treated poorly

1:37:15

for wanting to have an independent

1:37:17

life. But this movie doesn't

1:37:20

show any shade of gray. It's just like, yeah,

1:37:22

this happens to you. You're fucked. So

1:37:24

thank god George Bailey was

1:37:26

born. And you're like, I don't know.

1:37:29

Right, because there were movies, like classic

1:37:31

Hollywood movies from this era that do

1:37:33

examine and like subvert

1:37:36

gender roles and sexism and patriarchal

1:37:39

values, but this movie just simply

1:37:42

is not one of them.

1:37:43

It's just like presents it as fact.

1:37:45

Yeah, yeah, yeah, so

1:37:47

that's rather frustrating.

1:37:51

Let's talk about Annie, yes

1:37:53

please. So

1:37:55

she is the I believe,

1:37:57

only person of color in the entire movie

1:38:00

with any kind of speaking role, and

1:38:02

just kind of the only person of color you see

1:38:05

on screen period.

1:38:08

There are a few background actors

1:38:10

who are people of color, but it's certainly the

1:38:12

only speaking role by a country

1:38:14

mile.

1:38:14

Yes, she's played by Lillian

1:38:16

Randolph. So she is

1:38:19

the character who works for the

1:38:21

Bailey family as like

1:38:24

a maid or a housekeeper. So

1:38:26

she's in a very you know,

1:38:29

stereotypical role for black

1:38:31

actors to be in. At this time,

1:38:34

roles for black actors were often relegated

1:38:36

to service roles helping white

1:38:39

people, and that's also a trend that continues

1:38:42

still to this day. Still.

1:38:44

Yeah, so I think that she's she's

1:38:46

also presented as

1:38:49

I mean, she's presented as comic relief, yes,

1:38:51

and speaking to like Lilian Randolph's

1:38:54

performance great. And I

1:38:57

was reading more about Lillian Randolph

1:38:59

and it she played

1:39:02

the comedic relief role many

1:39:04

many times because those

1:39:06

were the only roles that were made available to

1:39:08

her throughout her career, and she does

1:39:10

it incredibly well. She's clearly a very

1:39:12

talented actor.

1:39:14

She has all the best lines in the

1:39:17

movie.

1:39:17

Well, and I think if they're not delivered with

1:39:20

her performance, they would be weird. But

1:39:22

like she makes it work and she's not

1:39:24

given really anything to

1:39:27

work with. But yeah, I mean, she's presented

1:39:29

as the help, she is presented

1:39:32

as the comic relief, and

1:39:35

she's also presented as less smart

1:39:37

than the people that she works for. Where

1:39:39

I mean, the first exchange she has

1:39:42

is with George's mother,

1:39:44

who, as we talked about in the live show, also has

1:39:46

nothing to do other than my husband, my

1:39:48

son, my husband, my son. Right, yeah, but

1:39:51

one of the few exchanges they have

1:39:53

is I mean, it's so well presented by

1:39:55

Annie that you're like, I'm on Annie's side, but it's

1:39:57

like presented that like she doesn't

1:39:59

understand and why

1:40:02

it because she says something like

1:40:05

the only girl children, and you're

1:40:07

like, George.

1:40:08

And Harry are upstairs rough

1:40:10

housing, even though they're like adults

1:40:12

by this point.

1:40:13

It sounds like they're well they're both forty,

1:40:16

but you're like, oh, I guess you're eighteen. I

1:40:18

know, I know, but you're still like it's

1:40:21

distracting, it's distracting.

1:40:24

Anyway, they're making a lot of commotion and

1:40:26

Annie is like, you know, hitting the

1:40:29

broom against the roof, and then she says something

1:40:31

like, oh, this is why all children

1:40:34

should be girls. And then missus Bailey

1:40:36

responds with something like, but if all children

1:40:38

were girls, then never

1:40:40

mind. Is if, like I think, Annie

1:40:43

doesn't understand it, like procreation

1:40:45

works like Annie.

1:40:47

In the world of the scene, it's delivered

1:40:49

as if she is making a joke and

1:40:51

the mom doesn't get it. But it doesn't seem like

1:40:53

it's written that way because the whole movie is written

1:40:55

so disrespectfully towards her. And then shortly

1:40:57

after we see her assaulted by

1:41:00

Harry, and that's presented

1:41:02

as a joke too. I went back to the original

1:41:04

script to see if that

1:41:07

was in the original script, and

1:41:09

Dick was it says

1:41:12

quote as he pushes her through the kitchen door, he

1:41:14

slaps her fanny, she screams. The

1:41:16

noise is cut off by the swinging door, like it's

1:41:18

presented as a button to

1:41:21

a scene. Yeah,

1:41:23

so that is also and she's

1:41:26

I mean, not the only woman in the

1:41:28

movie to be sexually harassed. I

1:41:31

think that that is a pretty evenly. That

1:41:34

is an evenly distributed crime throughout

1:41:36

the movie. But it's I

1:41:38

mean, with a character who is on screen for

1:41:40

all but two minutes only in

1:41:43

service to white characters and as comic relief,

1:41:46

she still is sexually

1:41:48

assaulted on screen as a joke.

1:41:51

Horrifying. She does have my

1:41:53

favorite line of the movie at the very

1:41:55

end, when all the community are like pitching

1:41:58

in and giving money to the

1:42:00

Bailey family, she says, I've

1:42:03

been saving this money for a divorce, but

1:42:07

you and then like you can have it though,

1:42:09

And I'm like, okay, first of all, Annie, keep your money,

1:42:11

don't give it to George Bailey.

1:42:13

Any get your damn divorce. Whatever

1:42:15

he did, whatever he did, he's

1:42:18

a dog.

1:42:19

No.

1:42:19

I read it as like she doesn't

1:42:21

even have a partner yet. She's the

1:42:23

way that some people will be like, oh, I'm saving up

1:42:25

for a wedding. She just like knows that inevitably

1:42:29

she will get divorced. I mean, I don't know.

1:42:31

I thought she was married. Well that

1:42:33