The Graduate and Post Grad: College graduates struggling to find purpose after college make questionable and inarguably wrong romantic choices.
127 Hours with a Film Kid: We talk about what got us “upset” at the Emmys and a desperately needed David Lynch update.
Alex Borstein sits on the roof drinking
Ramy Youssef waves goodbye to his Emmy
Content Warning: This episode contains discussions about rape, sexual assault, groping, sexual harassment, and stalking. If you would like to skip The Graduate, the time stamp is 38:12.
The Graduate: Lindsey feels that she is being gaslighted by a movie more than 50 years old, plus we discuss the benefits of running track in college, and argue that first dates should end in fries, not romantic gestures.
Post Grad: We reminisce upon the bygone era of learning to code from Myspace, the likelihood of being impressed by an inflatable couch, and the apparent impossibility of distinguishing Michael Keaton and J.K. Simmons.
Find Us Online
https://filmkidsgiantsquids.com
https://twitter.com/FilmSquidsPod
https://www.instagram.com/filmsquidspod/
https://www.facebook.com/filmsquidspod
Film Kid Giant Squids is produced and hosted by Lindsey Buttel and Brooke Hoppe. Intro music is by the band Poly Action, transition music is by kongr45gpen licensed under CC BY 3.0
Brooke: I feel like that’s just really a sign of 2020. It’s like our hope rests on a ping pong ball that won't get drawn.
[Intro Music]
Brooke: You’re listening to Film Kids and Giant Squids.
Lindsey: And Other Things That Think They’re Deep. I'm Lindsey.
Brooke: And I’m Brooke. And this week we’re talking about The Graduate and Post Grad.
Lindsey: Just in time for you to be home with your hot neighbor. Cause we're all home.
Brooke: I was like who's going home? Yeah, when your college campus gets shut down for COVID and you're forced to go back home, you can go hook up with your hot neighbor. Although maybe don’t cause COVID.
Lindsey: Don’t do that.
Brooke: Wait two weeks, get a test, and then hook up with your hot neighbor.
Lindsey: Yeah.
Brooke: Kay. But before we can get to those movies. We need to do 127 Hours with a Film Kid.
[127 Hours with a Film Kid Transition Music]
Brooke: So Emmys. Emmys were last weekend. I feel like most people like even if you're not super into the industry you kind of at least were vaguely aware that they were happening.
Lindsey: Or your twitter was filled with Zendaya cause she's amazing and this is a Zendaya stan podcast.
Brooke: Oh 1000 percent.
Lindsey: And if you don’t like her please stop listening.
Brooke: Zendaya she won. She's the youngest ever to win lead actress in a drama.
Lindsey: And only the second Black woman to win lead actress in a drama.
Brooke: Yeah. The Emmys if you didn’t watch it were done all virtual. So The Emmys sent like camera kits to all the nominees so that if they won they would be able to give their speech. So Zendaya’s like room was one of my favorites, cause like the entire like family was there and they all- there was one who looked like she was about to pass out when Zendaya won. It was just like so happy.
Lindsey: It was so wholesome.
Brooke: And screaming like-
Lindsey: I liked the like, I mean except for like the occasional time where there were delays and the fact that Jimmy Kimmel got probably an hour uninterrupted of COVID jokes-
Brooke: It was all COVID jokes.
Lindsey: I liked the zoom groupings. Like you don’t have to wait for people to walk up the stage. Like they seemed more comfortable.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: Just like chilling at their tables either with the rest of their crew. Like their cast and crew. Or with their families.
Brooke: Yeah, people were doing it in different ways. Like Schitt’s Creek, they rented a fucking tent in Toronto. There were so many things that if you take out of context and somehow manage to send images from this Emmys back to like 2018, and like, that like wouldn’t make sense of like the Schitt’s Creek tent, everyone in masks.
Lindsey: I don’t know who was dressed up on the bed on the roof drinking wine but I loved her.
Brooke: One of my favorite things though that I saw on the internet was I think it was the New York Post put out a tweet being like biggest Emmys upset, Zendaya wins. And the internet just collectively forgot what upset meant. And they're like, who's mad that Zendaya won? That’s racist!
Lindsey: I saw so many tweets that were like I'm not upset.
Brooke: No one's upset that she won but it was an upset.
Lindsey: We’re all quite happy.
Brooke: The other thing that I found hilarious was the method of distributing the Emmys. Essentially they sent like people in these like hazmat suits to all the nominees that would then hand them the Emmy if they won. Then if they didn’t win, the person would still be there. Like it's not like the Emmys knew who was winning in advance.
Lindsey: I thought Ramy did that as a joke.
Brooke: No.
Lindsey: Like I thought that he bought a hazmat suit and had his friend stand outside sarcastically with it.
Brooke: Yeah, no so Ramy tweeted out a video after he lost the Emmy of the person like waving outside the window but in a hazmat suit being like ‘hi.’ But no cause you could see on the Schitt’s Creek tent at one point the hazmat suit enters to hand an Emmy. Like they had this whole system to keep it COVID-free and its just so fucking weird. But yeah that was the Emmys. Next up, its fucking David lynch. You already know I'm obsessed with him and what he's doing online. So first, just update to the weather reports cause everyone needs these. He’s added something to them. He now wears sunglasses everyday-
Lindsey: Ooo.
Brooke: Because the future's so bright.
Lindsey: Uh…Hmm…that’s a take.
Brooke: But also more importantly the painted jar has a purpose.
Lindsey: Ooo.
Brooke: For those of you who didn’t listen to that episode, he introduced in one episode this jar that was like half painted and black and was like I bet you're wondering what this jar is for. That will be revealed soon, and just left it at that. Well now it has a purpose, except it really doesn't; it’s a weird purpose. The purpose of this jar is he has put 10 ping pong balls in this jar, all numbered from one through ten, and then each day he swirls the balls and pulls one out, and that is today's number.
Lindsey: Okay. What are you confused about?
Brooke: What does that mean?
Lindsey: That’s that day's number.
Brooke: For reference so today is the 21st of September.
Lindsey: Is today a five? Today feels like a five.
Brooke: Today is not a five. Today is a four. You were close.
Lindsey: Oh my god I was close. Damn. Okay.
Brooke: But he's been doing this for a little over a month. He's been doing, today was day 37, and people in the comments have gotten way too invested in this. There is one person named Wes who all he wants in life is for today's number to be a seven. In 37 days, a 7 has not yet been pulled.
Lindsey: Oh my god. What are like the statistics of that? Math people. I'm math people, technically.
Brooke: Someone else has the statistics.
Lindsey: Other math people.
Brooke: Today is day 37. It's been over four weeks without a 2 and over 5 weeks without a 7.
Lindsey: Wow.
Brooke: The chances of one or more numbers being unpicked for at least as long as 7 has, are actually 19.1 percent. Doesn’t seem that low but it feels really weird.
Lindsey: Yeah.
Brooke: This one person gives the stats each days and like has the sequence of numbers. The most picked right now is a tie between 8 and 9. Both have been picked 9 times.
Lindsey: Ooo, I wish I could be this invested in David Lynch.
Brooke: Right?
Lindsey: Like I understand that I could be but like I wish I wanted to be this invested.
Brooke: I wish I wanted to be this invested in getting a number 7 pulled like this person. So yeah this commenter named Wes he literally will comment every day being like if its not a fucking 7 im loosing my mind.
Lindsey: Oh my god Wes you’ve lost it already.
Brooke: It's just a weird thing to be so invested in, to be like all my happiness rides on a single ping pong ball but like hey man it's quarantine you gotta do what you gotta do.
Lindsey: I mean like a lot of our sanity is beyond a ping pong ball, so like if you could keep it on a ping pong ball like-
Brooke: That’s fair. The thing is though that the pong pong ball hasn’t been pulled yet so that’s just really a sign of 2020. It’s like our hope rests on a ping pong ball that won't get drawn.
Lindsey: And the ping pong ball is going to explode in that jar.
Brooke: So we’re just gonna do a quick roundup of lawsuits and lawsuit updates this week.
Lindsey: I love lawsuits.
Brooke: So two intellectual theft cases have come out recently. There's so many in Hollywood. Like 99 out of 100 go nowhere because it's really hard to say. Like you can't prove that you came up with a – that’s why like Friends With Benefits and No Strings Attached. Like they didn’t sue each other. Even though it’s the same essential plot at the same time.
Lindsey: None of our shows on this podcast sued each other.
Brooke: Yeah that’s very true.
Lindsey: As of yet.
Brooke: As of yet.
Lindsey: Ooo. We should do an episode where they sue each other.
Brooke: Okay so first was Melissa McCarthy, Warner Brothers, and more are getting sued over Life of the Party. So for those who don’t know what that is, Life of the Party was a 2018 movie where Melissa McCarthy plays this mom who basically follows her daughter to college. Like she also attends college with her daughter.
Lindsey: Oh, I know I've seen trailers for this.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: Was that like a good movie?
Brooke: It was like, a Melissa McCarthy movie I feel like. It wasn’t Bridesmaids level funny but like, like it won like a People’s Choice Award.
Lindsey: Okay.
Brooke: The plaintiff is saying that they pitched this movie to Gersh, which is an agency, in 2015 with a treatment and is claiming that the collection of Hollywood heavyweights had a quote on quote secret agreement to rip off the whole thing from her WGA registered treatment and script called college mom.
Lindsey: Pfft.
Brooke: I love the idea that she thinks there's this huge conspiracy to steal this C-level comedy. Like-
Lindsey: Who wants to steal college mom?
Brooke: Like it's not like. I don’t know. It's not like this huge movie that became like, oh this is the funniest thing we've seen in years. Like it was-
Lindsey: That’s more like why I asked. I was like is this suing worth like your B-level movie?
Brooke: Yeah. She's suing for like 10 million dollars or something insane.
Lindsey: Wow.
Brooke: Almost guaranteed this is gonna go nowhere. Cause again it's pretty hard to prove that you had an idea that’s uniquely yours that no one else could have thought of. Like. Anyway, the second thing is Gary Oldman and NBC Universal and more-
Lindsey: Awww. Oh no!
Brooke: -are getting sued over the Oscar-winning film the Darkest Hour, which was that 2017 movie about Winston Churchill, and Gary Oldman won for his portrayal of Churchill. So a History Channel writer is suing for allegedly ripping off parts of his script. The writer says Gary Oldman and more had access to at least 3 drafts of his Churchill project and that very specific parts have been stolen for his project. But interestingly Anthony McCarten, who wrote the Darkest Hour, is not being sued.
Lindsey: How is it just Gary Oldman and NBC then? Is it for like speaking the lines?
Brooke: I just read the Deadline article about it where the History Channel writer says that he had a quote on quote agreement that Gary Oldman was going to star in his project, but there's been no like real proof of that.
Lindsey: Ooo. This is just a ploy to get Gary Oldman in his project.
Brooke: So who knows if either of those lawsuits will go anywhere. That is what the film kids are talking about, and that’s what you need to know to get through a conversation without feeling like you have to cut off your arm to escape.
[Scarborough Fair Transition Music]
Brooke: So The Graduate. Before we get started we need to address the sexual assault of it all. In today’s viewing this movie is about sexual assault slash harassment of Ben by Mrs.. Robinson and subsequent harassment and stalking of Elaine.
Lindsey: I don’t think I had seen it before. I think it was on in like the common room in college and like I was doing other things at the time. And I don’t remember people specifically being like it’s very problematic. In which case when I saw it I was genuinely shocked.
Brooke: Sorry.
Lindsey: And like I've heard things about this movie. But like never those things. So I was like are people just looking past this? Did people not think this was like assault?
Brooke: So I'm not condoning this movie but 50 years ago, when this movie was released, these types of actions were not seen as sexual assault. The art of seduction was paramount, meaning anyone who said no was seen as just not being persuaded to say yes yet. In addition, the 1960s view of sex did not allow for men to be seen as victims. Which obviously was bullshit. It was bullshit then. It is bullshit now. But to condemn this movie would also be to condemn an entire era, and I think what this movie accomplishes, to ignore that is wrong as well. That being said, Dustin Hoffman has also come up in several allegations during the #MeToo movement. Several women have come forward-
Lindsey: Oh I did not know that.
Brooke: Saying that he's either groped, revealed himself, demanded sexual acts at various points over various decades from the 70s to the 90s, specifically on the set of The Graduate Dustin pinched Katharine Ross who plays Elaine on her left buttocks in order to “loosen her up.” Also the moment where Ben places his hand on Mrs. Robinson’s boob was completely unscripted. The director Mike Nichols asked Hoffman to feel her up during that sequence and they both kept this secret from Anne Bancroft who plays Mrs. Robinson.
Lindsey: Ew.
Brooke: In today's filmmaking that thankfully would not happen. There are now intimacy coordinator positions on set who ensure the wellbeing of actors and sex and other intimate scenes. So by talking about this film we are not condoning that, nor are we siding with Dustin Hoffman. We will always believe people coming forward about their abuser. And if you want to skip the graduate we will put the timestamp in our show notes.
Lindsey: I like that.
Brooke: Okay so for my tweet I kind of cheated and I used phone a friend. For context, Lindsey and I have a friend from college who is obsessed with this movie-
Lindsey: No.
Brooke: -To a point where we jokingly created a drinking game about watching this movie with him. And whenever he would say certain things he would take a drink. So I reached out to him and asked him in 50 words or less, why do you like this movie. So my tweet is just his response. Here it is. It is, by the way this isn’t really sentences these are just thoughts. Its long lens cinematography, strong color and motif scenes, revolutionary editing, Simon and Garfunkel, Elaaaaine, generation gap defining, about the hippies without ever showing a hippie, aaannnddd MILF. Again, not my words.
Lindsey: Alright Benson. Mine is neighborhood mom teaches an LA virgin how to have sex so her daughters sex life can be…slightly less awkward.
Brooke: Okay so as I mentioned this film is directed by Mike Nichols starring Dustin Hoffman and Anne Bancroft. It was released in 1967. It was nominated for 7 Oscars. It won for best director. It was placed on number 7 on AFI’s 100 years, 100 movies list in ‘98. And then in 2007 when they revised this list was number 17, but it was still on there. It is in the US national film registry for reservation for being culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant.
Lindsey: I like the idea of something being aesthetically significant. Like I want to be aesthetically significant. But there we are.
Brooke: You are aesthetically significant.
Lindsey: Thanks.
Brooke: So we open on a closeup of Ben and it pulls out to reveal that he's on a plane, and then he lands-
Lindsey: In a suit I will add!
Brooke: Yeah. The ‘60s are wild. They used to dress up to get on planes. They also used to sell-
Lindsey: Yo people still do that in DC.
Brooke: -life insurance in vending machines before you got on a plane.
Lindsey: Uh? That’s alarming.
Brooke: Wild times. So yeah he's on the plane, he lands in LA. And then there's a really really long take of him standing on this moving walkway as the “Sound of Silence” plays.
Lindsey: Which like also I understand that this was probably one of the first movies that did that but I feel like when movies play that song it's like as a joke.
Brooke: I mean they're all referencing this.
Lindsey: I know this started it but it's like three times. It's three times. Granted I liked the soundtrack of it.
Brooke: At the time it was very unusual to use existing songs in a film soundtrack.
Lindsey: Oh interesting.
Brooke: The fact that “Sound of Silence” was an existing song it was extremely rare, and because this movie was so successful, this movie kind of changed that. Now movies use existing songs because of this. Originally the “Sound of Silence” was used as an editing placeholder just so that the editor could edit to the right feel during those sequences, but Nichols liked the song.
Lindsey: I like to not think it was about the beat and it was just hello darkness my old friend was indicative of Ben.
Brooke: I mean yeah it is. But Nichols liked the song so much they ended up keeping it. Simon and Garfunkel were originally hired to write three new songs for this movie but Simon just kept maintaining that they didn’t have enough time. Mrs. Robinson was one of the original songs for this movie but it originally wasn’t Mrs. Robinson. It was just a song that Simon was writing called Mrs. Roosevelt that they changed to be Mrs. Robinson for the movie.
Lindsey: Who was Mrs. Roosevelt?
Brooke: Like the first lady?
Lindsey: Oh. Did they know her?
Brooke: No it was just like about the era.
Lindsey: Oh okay. That makes sense.
Brooke: (sarcastically) Did they know her?
Lindsey: They could have just changed the whole movie and had them be the Roosevelts.
Brooke: That would have been weird.
Lindsey: Would it though?
Brooke: Yes.
Linsdey: it’s a common last name.
Brooke: You can't make a movie in the ‘60s about a family named the Roosevelts and not have it be referential. So yeah that is on this moving walkway and the shot you can read into it a lot. I will not be discussing all of the metaphors and all the different ways you can read all the shots because we will be here literally all day. The cinematographer Robert Surtees has been quoted as saying “I needed everything I learned in the previous 30 years to shoot The Graduate.” The cinematography, the editing, like that stuff is why I like it. I do not like it for the plot.
Lindsey: Well….i dislike it for the plot.
Brooke: To give you an idea I am gonna break down this first shot of him on the moving walkway and then you can extrapolate to see how much intention every single shot has in this movie. So Ben is standing on this moving walkway. And it's moving from the right side of the screen to the left. Because we read left to right anything that moves in that direction feels natural and kind of like a progression to our eyes, so him moving from the opposite direction shows his lack of progression. Further, he isn’t doing the actual moving. He's standing on a thing that’s moving him. This again is a metaphor for his life. He hasn’t actually had control of anything. He's gone through education and is just now at a point where he can make a choice and instead what he does in the movie is the lack of choice. He doesn’t actually choose anything he just drifts for most of the movie.
Lindsey: It doesn’t seem like he wants to do anything either.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: Like I don’t even know what he went to school for.
Brooke: Exactly. A lot of this movie is about him trying to get control of his life. Further, other people are walking past him and he kind of looks at them almost longingly. So he can see what he wants but just isn’t sure how he's gonna get there. And finally the music of this shot. So “Sound of SIlence” becomes the theme of this movie whenever Ben is lost and aimless. We hear it now; we hear it in the pool in that like montage moment and finally at the end. Like I said this is a very basic shot but it conveys a lot and I will not be doing this with every shot because, again, we don’t have 6 hours for this podcast. So he goes home and then we see him sitting in his bedroom, the fish tank is behind him. There's a little scuba man in it. His dad comes in and stands between Ben and the camera and he says there's guests here to see him but Ben just wants to be alone. And he's worried about his future. His mom comes in and fully blocks the shot. Metaphorically his parents are overbearing and he doesn’t take up any space. His parents do that for him. So the next sequence where he's downstairs at this party is really well done. He’s overwhelmed by his parents' friends and you can feel this frenzied, claustrophobic nature in this sequence. There's constantly new characters being introduced, hands are being put on him, every time you turn there's a cut. It's just a really well edited shot. After Mr. Mcguire tells him about the plastics and the future of plastics he runs up to his room where he looks down on the party from the window. Important to note Nichols uses glass and water a lot in this movie. And it almost always is to convey Ben's emotional state. So here the glass of the windows kind of say that he's cut off from this world of his parents. He isn’t a part of it but he can still see it. He's distant but he's not removed.
Lindsey: Yeah I also get why he didn’t want to go to the fucking party if every single adult there is talking about how he can quote on quote get underaged women, destroy the environment, and then read things about him from his college yearbook out loud which I didn’t even know colleges had.
Brooke: So then Mrs. Robinson comes into Ben's room and Ben says I'm just sort of disturbed about things because sure. Mrs. Robinson asks Ben to drive her home, but Ben doesn’t want to. He says that she can just take the car but she doesn’t know how to drive it. So she tosses the keys back to him and they land in the fish tank.
Lindsey: Uh, she threw them in the fish tank on purpose and if someone did that to me I'd be like bitch you don’t get a ride home now. We over. Like that’s it. It's done.
Brooke: So Ben drives her home. Mrs. Robinson asks him to come in because she doesn’t feel safe until she gets the lights on. Then she invites him in and pours him a drink. She tells him to stay until her husband comes home. And she asks him what he thinks of her and admits that she's an alcoholic and then we get the famous quote “Mrs. Robinson you're trying to seduce me, aren’t you?” Which is shot from under Mrs. Robinson’s leg, but the focus is pulled on Ben. Mrs. Robinson denies wanting to seduce him and shows him Elaine's portrait, which like if my parents one got a portrait of me and then hung it in my own bedroom.
Lindsey: Or just did anything like try to like assault people my age in my own room.
Brooke: Yeah that’s fair.
Lindsey: But here we are.
Brooke: Ben just continuously wants to leave. He actually goes to leave but Mrs. Robinson asks Ben to bring up her purse and he does and then Mrs. Robinson is naked and shuts the door. So they use what is known as a stutter cut for Ben turning around, which is just where we see that action repeat. So much of the editing and cinematography of this movie is just to kind of give the audience an insight into what Ben is thinking and his emotional state. So as this conversation continues with Mrs. Robinson and Ben you see those very very brief flashes of nudity. Like you see like her boob and you see different parts of her and that’s how Ben is feeling. He's trying not to look but he can't help but looking because he's a man and that’s what they do.
Lindsey: Ehhhh, I fucking hate the ‘60s.
Brooke: So then Mr. Robinson comes home, seemingly from golfing? Like he has a golf bag with him, which is weird because it's late at night so where was Mr. Robinson really but okay? And then Ben runs very speedily through the house, and then if you look at the shot right before Mr. Robinson comes in, like the focus of the shot is on the drink on the bar. And then again that’s just Ben's desire to have an excuse to be there like, he's just like looking for a vice, looking for a way out, and then Mr. Robinson has a nice talk with Ben. He tells Ben that he should be taking things easier and go sow some wild oats. Then he tells him to call his daughter.
Lindsey: Why? Why? Like why? Like why is everyone in this movie so obsessed with like, I don’t know, being like Ben you need to like fuck around before you can do anything. Fuck around with my daughter. Like ahhhh. I'm so uncomfortable this entire time.
Brooke: So then we have the party at Ben's house for his 21st birthday and Ben's dad is trying to get him to come out but Ben doesn’t want to come out. And then he eventually does come out in the scuba suit.
Lindsey: Breathing so uncomfortably for so long.
Brooke: Ben is just on display for his parents and then we go from the shot inside the scuba mask where you can't hear anything again through the glass of the scuba mask. So again showing that he is disconnected from his parents world kind of emphasizing that gap that they have. So yeah you can't hear anything in this shot besides Ben’s breathing and then everyone's cheering, and Ben goes underwater. He tries to come up but his dad's hand comes into the frame and pushes him back down. Then the next shot is just a really well done shot of Ben deep under the pool that clearly isn’t that deep, but he's deep under the pool and there's kind of a lot of empty space, that water, and while he's underwater we hear the beginning of the phone call between him and Mrs. Robinson where he's inviting her to come to the hotel.
Lindsey: And still looks fucking scared and terrified.
Brooke: Yeah. And Mrs. Robinson says that she'll be there in an hour. And as he walks up to the door of the hotel a bunch of old people are coming out and he holds the door open for a bunch of young people to come in. Then he goes to the bar area and Mrs. Robinson arrives and we see it from a shot of the reflection of the table. We don’t see them, we see just the reflection. Ben can't get the waiter's attention but Mrs. Robinson can get it very quickly. She then asks him if he's gotten a room yet so he approaches the desk. He signs and registers and then immediately removes that entry to sign in as Mr. Gladstone and he continues to be an anxious mess. He forgets to tell Mrs. Robinson the room number, he's very anxious about the check-in clerk knowing what's happening, which is all just red flags that it shouldn’t be happening but okay.
Lindsey: I will also say I did make a note about the cinematography here in which I called them creepy shots. Because a lot of them are looking from behind things and then I said why is Ben watching people so closely? Why is he watching them from behind walls? Why is he watching them so intently? Why are we watching you from like underneath? Tis all.
Brooke: So he goes up to the hotel room. He turns the lights on then immediately turns them off and only leaves on the bathroom light and then opens the door a little bit to let the light in. He then shuts all the blinds and Mrs. Robinson knocks on the door, comes in and then immediately turns on the lights, but Ben turns them off. She starts to get undressed. Ben just places his hand on her breast and then immediately goes and slams his head against the wall. Again, signs that you shouldn’t be doing this.
Lindsey: Yeah. My only note was that I'm so uncomfortable. I can't watch this.
Brooke: Yeah. So he tells Mrs. Robinson he can't go through with this and she kind of reverse psychology manipulates him and she calls him inadequate. So he slams the door into the bathroom shut putting them into total darkness and then they have sex. So then the “Sound of Silence” plays again and this next sequence is incredibly well edited and kind of revolutionary for this time. So it's Ben drifting through this period of his life. It’s mimicked in the smash cuts where he goes from the pool to the hotel room almost seamlessly. Like he's in the pool and he jumps up onto the floatie but its like him jumping up into Mrs. Robinson or where he's putting on a shirt and like leaving the pool and now he's in the hotel room like just the way that is so seamless is very well done. This montage ends with Ben in the pool and his dad kind of standing over him and Ben’s just saying I was just saying that I'm drifting…here in the pool. The Robinson’s come over and you kind of get this shot of them standing over Ben emphasizing this generational gap and emphasizing the previous generations just overbearingness on the Ben generation.
Lindsey: Which like I get, but if Bens fucking like representation fo the young generation, like ehhh.
Brooke: Yeah Mr. Robinson again wants Ben to call Elaine. Then he's in the bathroom shaving and Ben's mom comes in and tries to get him to say where he goes at night and we get this closeup of the razor on Ben's neck.
Lindsey: Ben’s also like I don’t meet anyone, why would you even say that? As if he's not gone til noon the next day. Like does he not have friends that he can even pretend that he's seeing? Like he's just kind of like no im not? Like?
Brooke: I'm just driving around. All I do is drive.
Lindsey: All I do is drive for 12 hours straight every night. Just patrolling.
Brooke: Then at the hotel Mrs. Robinson and Ben have a conversation. They talk about Mr. Robinson and Ben learns she only married him because she was pregnant with Elaine.
Lindsey: Ben also asks why they don’t talk and then answer is because his voice is fucking infuriating. And then! He's like you talking about my college life is too invasive. Let's talk about your husband. This is where I switched to hating Ben.
Brooke: So Mrs. Robinson tells Ben that he can't ask her daughter on a date and he says well I had no intentions of doing that, why would you even talk about that and then kind of switches and goes well why can't I, why can't I even talk about her and kind of comes to the realization that she thinks he isn’t good enough for her daughter. They get into this argument and Ben like gets dressed and says a lot of hurtful things to Mrs. Robinson and then they kind of turn and ultimately Ben doesn’t leave.
Lindsey: And also is like because you had sex with her mom not an answer?
Brooke: Obviously not Linds. Have you seen the rest of this movie?
Lindsey: Is that not even slightly valid?
Brooke: Nope. So Ben's dad tells Ben that he needs to ask Elaine out, and then his parents nag him while swimming literal circles around him in the pools. Ben's mom then says well she'll just invite them all over on Thursday night so Ben decides to invite her out to avoid that because that would be terrible.
Lindsey: And also why was he like the thought never occurred to me to take out Elaine. Like every single character has been like go out with Elaine. Obviously it would come up. I feel Ben is gaslighting me specifically. That’s…that’s all.
Brooke: Well in his mind it hasn’t come up because hes literally fucking her mom. He's like no I would never consider doing that because it would be weird.
Lindsey: And also like take Elaine out of the situation, if I were sleeping with someone and that person was like hey do you think I should date these other people, even if we weren’t dating, that isn't a conversation that I want to have with you.
Brooke: Fully agree.
Lindsey: And it's especially not a conversation if it's about my daughter.
Brooke: Yeah. Ben decides he's gonna be as much of a dick as possible so he takes Elaine to a strip club.
Lindsey: While wearing sunglasses inside.
Brooke: At night.
Lindsey: At night.
Brooke: When the striper shakes her tassel tits above Elaine and Elaine starts to cry Ben realizes that he's been a complete dick. He tries to apologize, she just wants to go home, and then he kisses her to make her stop crying.
Lindsey: He just says “stop crying.”
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: Ugghh. Asshole.
Brooke: So then they go to a drive-in and talk and again we get a shot through the glass where we can’t hear them but now Ben’s not alone he has Elaine. So then he drives her home, Elaine invites him in and obviously he can't do that so he suggests they just go somewhere. He drives off but then when she suggests they go to the hotel he immediately wrecks the car. So they go to the hotel and everyone there addresses him as Mr. Gladstone and Elaine figures out that he's been having an affair with someone so Elaine asks is it over and Ben says yes. Then instead of a goodnight kiss Ben tosses a bag of fries her way and that is the only thing that I like that he does in this movie. Just like toss me fries when you end a date please.
Lindsey: Regardless of if we have fries on the date. Just keep a bag of fries for me.
Brooke: No it needs to be fresh fryer fries because old fries would not be good.
Lindsey: Yes like buy fries.
Brooke: Like on the way home.
Lindsey: At some point during the date. The fries don’t need to be part of the date.
Brooke: The next day he pulls up to the Robinson’s and instead of Elaine getting in Mrs. Robinson gets in the car. She tells Ben that she's going to tell Elaine everything. He says that he doesn’t believe her and she kind of goes try me. So he runs to Elaine-
Lindsey: And also why wouldn’t you believe her. What part of any of this situation makes you think that she would not do that?
Brooke: Self preservation. Cause like by telling Elaine she doesn’t like ruin her marriage and life.
Lindsey: There isn’t much there to save.
Brooke: He runs to Elaine in the rain and so he's soaked and he gets to her and he tells Elaine about Mrs. Robinson and we see Mrs. Robinson's face in the doorway. And then the shot pulls focus from Mrs. Robinson to Elaine who's starting to get tears in her eyes. So Elaine throws him out.
Lindsey: And he again tells her to stop crying. Like just let her have emotions.
Brooke: He doesn’t say stop crying he says don’t cry.
Lindsey: Oh sorry.
Brooke: Ben doesn’t have emotions, he's shut off from his own emotions, he's not used to processing emotions.
Lindsey: Hello darkness my old friend.
Brooke: So in the next shot its Mrs. Robinson outside of Elaine's room and Bens kind of in the corner of the shot and then the shot pulls back to show the actual distance between Mrs. Robinson and Ben. And this movie turns into Twilight because then Ben stalks Elaine.
Lindsey: When you're describing these shots I understand. My view is just its Ben being fucking creepy. You went on one date.
Brooke: Yeah. He then tells his parents that he's gonna marry Elaine. And like they're so excited.
Lindsey: After one date.
Brooke: And then he reveals that Elaine doesn’t know about it. In fact, she doesn’t even like him right now.
Lindsey: Nope. Nope. Nope. Nope.
Brooke: So he drives up to Berkeley and he sees Elaine but he doesn’t approach. He kind of runs away and he ends up stalking her some more. She eventually gets on a bus and he runs after it and runs very very fast. This man should run track.
Lindsey: He does run track. They said that at the party.
Brooke: He did that’s fair. I believe it. So he gets on the bus, Elaine doesn’t want to talk to him.
Lindsey: He pretends it’s a coincidence. He's like what are you doing on this bus that I ran after.
Brooke: And she uses the classic I’m meeting someone line, but he doesn’t get the hint and says oh cool I'll go to the zoo as well. And she's meeting Carl. So Elaine then goes to his room where he's staying and confronts him for raping her mom which is the story that Mrs. Robinson has told Elaine. Ben tells her the truth and she screams bloody murder which obviously gets the landlord and like every other man in the building to come. But Elaine's fine. She’s drinking water like that’s not problematic. Nothings happened here. Look she's fine. Then Elaine goes to leave but tells Ben she doesn’t want him to leave until he has a definite plan. So then Elaine comes back and asks Ben to kiss her. Then he asks her to marry him and he says well I might, so he says they should maybe get married the next day. So the next day Ben continues to ask and nag her about getting married and Elaine finally says that she needs to talk to Carl because she agreed to marry him, even though theoretically they’ve only been on one date. That’s the thing with Carl and Ben we only know they’ve been on one date. Ben returns back to his room and Mr. Robinson is in there who obviously hates Ben and tells him that he and Mrs. Robinson are getting divorced. Ben doesn’t understand why they would need to get a divorce and says the point is I don’t love your wife, I love your daughter, sir.
Lindsey: Don’t worry that I slept with your wife, she aint shit. How did you think that was gonna go Ben?
Brooke: He was like yeah I previously fucked your wife, now I want to fuck your daughter. What's the problem? Ben goes to Elaine but she has left Berkeley and has left him a note that she loves him but it would never work out. Ben then drives all the way back to LA. He goes to the Robinson's house and breaks in. He goes to Elaine's room and Mrs. Robinson is there. Mrs. Robinson calls the cops and apologizes to Ben for not inviting him to Elaine's wedding.
Lindsey: I added my is this cop propaganda and I said it was pro cop propaganda because they are advocating just willy nilly calling the cops for any quality of life complaint which cops shouldn’t have to handle but also I hate Ben and I'm fine with them calling the cops on him because I hate him and he deserves it. So I'm not gonna advocate either way. Actually she should also be in jail because she assaulted him. But here we are. Everyone in this movie should be in jail. So I'm not gonna comment.
Brooke: So then Ben drives all the way back to Berkeley and he talks to Carl's friends and learns that he's getting married somewhere in Santa Barbara. He drives to Santa Barbara and finds a phonebook and somehow manages to call Carl's dad's medical office, which the fact that there's only one doctor Smith in all of Santa Barbara feels very strange to me but okay. So he learns from the receptionist the wedding is more than likely over and he claims to be the reverend and he says that he just forgot where the church is and she tells him its on Allen street. So on his way there his car runs out of gas and he runs the rest of the way on foot. Man his track practice really comes in handy.
Lindsey: He's a fast runner. That’s what track was for.
Brooke: He gets to the church. The front doors are locked so he runs up to the balcony and he sees them kiss meaning he's too late so he starts banging on the glass, again the glass, screaming Elaine.
Lindsey: I hated this. I had secondhand embarrassment this entire time.
Brooke: So then Elaine sees him and like starts walking toward him and then we get the shot from Elaine’s perspective where she can't hear anything that people around her are saying but they just look very angry. So she attempts to run to Ben. Ben and Mr. Robinson fight. He goes down and goes into the church meaning he leaves behind the glass. So then he uses a crucifix as a weapon. And then uses it to barricade the door so everyone is trapped inside of the church.
Lindsey: I did enjoy that. That was my single moment of joy.
Brooke: He and Elaine run off together, they get on the bus, and drive off. Everyone is staring at him. They sit down and then they're smiling, they're happy, and then they start to look uncertain and the “Sound of Silence” plays.
Lindsey: My ending quote was yeah what now you fucking freaks. Look at each other on the bus. Be concerned.
Brooke: Yeah the ending of the movie is kind of- were back at the beginning where Ben no longer knows what he wants to do next or how to get there. He's kind of uncertain and lost and aimless and just because he has Elaine by his side doesn’t mean everythings gonna be magically fixed. That is The Graduate
Lindsey: Woo. I take back my woo. Not a woo. I'm upset.
[Scarborough Fair Transition Music]
Lindsey: In another story of recent college grads thinking that they're in love because they're bored and/or misguided, we have Post Grad. My tweet is misinterpreting the advice of a cinematographer, a recent college grad quits her dream job to move in with a classmate who guilted her into a date.
Brooke: My tweet is it’s okay to give up your dream job for absolutely no reason at all. I mean, for love.
Lindsey: She doesn’t love him! See, this whole time I was like Adam is creepy and whiny. But then I was like just kidding Ben’s worse, so I had to edit my notes.
Brooke: Yeah like Adam isn’t great but at least he doesn’t stalk anybody.
Lindsey: That’s fair. He's just a little whiny and doesn’t understand that women can be your friend.
Brooke: Yeah he's a nice guy who like believes in the friend zone, which like I hate the friend zone as a concept.
Lindsey: I know. Like I’m sorry you tried to kiss your friend and they said hey please don’t do that and then you sang about it at a department store. I digress. It starts out classic 2009 with Rory from Gilmore Girls.
Brooke: Who basically plays Rory like the characters are very similar.
Lindsey: I never watched Gilmore Girls.
Brooke: Minus her being obsessed with journalism. She's obsessed with publishing. But like I love Gilmore Girls'but Rory is a very self-centered character who like won't acknowledge anyone else's feelings and only puts herself first and so is Ryden.
Lindsey: But Ryden is doing a blog, so 2009 about her college experience.
Brooke: On her Myspace page.
Lindsey: Oh I didn’t even realize that.
Brooke: Well it's like not myspace but it is clearly meant to be myspace it has her friends page.
Lindsey: Off-brand myspace.
Brooke: Oh my god doing like all the code. I was like a middle schooler.
Lindsey: I never had a Myspace but like my very brief knowledge of coding comes from like updating my tumblr page.
Brooke: My, yeah, my coding knowledge came from Myspace because I was so detailed I had so many like things in it and understanding code all came from Myspace.
Lindsey: Oh my god.
Brooke: I never deactivated my Myspace. I’m hoping Myspace did it on its own because I think they did. I don’t even have access to the email that I signed up with. Because it was like an AOL account.
Lindsey: Oh my god my AOL email.
Brooke: Yeah so like my parents set us all up one. My parents still to this day share an AOL email account. They were still paying for AOL until like 2010 or something insane because they didn’t- they thought if they stopped paying their emails would just go away. But that’s the email I used to sign up for Myspace. So I don’t have access to that email. I don’t have access to my Myspace, and I know it's so cringy because it was like 7th grade me.
Lindsey: Honestly it's probably a blessing that I never made a Myspace.
Brooke: Yeah probably.
Lindsey: I know it would still exist out there and someone one day would find it.
Brooke: I'm just hoping that Myspace has deleted it. That’s what I'm hoping.
Lindsey: But her blog is about her graduating from college with the goal of getting a job at an LA publishing house. Ryden’s family shows up to the graduation in the middle of the valedictorian speech and her grandmother starts eating Cheetos very loudly, much to the dismay of the crowd, which have any of you been to a graduation before? People just like scream in the middle of them announcing stuff all the time. Cheetos don’t fucking matter. Ryden’s friend, the presumptive love interest, Adam, ate dinner with her family because his dad, quote, is too busy to come and because his mom is dead end quote, which they're just getting right into the background of these characters.
Brooke: I know.
Lindsey: In the most blunt way they possibly can.
Brooke: This movie made me think of like a comment on a Facebook post of people being like readers in development, what do you hate the most and someone said if you say the name of the character six times in 3 sentences okay I get it you want me to know who this person is but you don’t naturally say their name that many times. And she says Adam like 6 times. She's like Adam why are you shrugging like okay again with the shrug Adam, like Adam I get it. Like okay I get it his name is Adam.
Lindsey: One of my friends, her brother, they always used to call him BJ and then she found out what blowjobs were and then she refused to call him BJ so she just started calling him brother, so like she was on the phone with her mom the other day and she was like is brother coming and I was like oh my god, this is the real life situation of someone just being like ah, sister does this in like movies when people were like. I think it was like from the same thread when it was like when people refer to their siblings like as like that in ways that they wouldn’t and I was like nope, this person is the sole example of that.
Brooke: Yeah or like the Sabrina reboot where he just exclusively calls sabrina cousin and cuz.
Lindsey: Ah I hated that.
Brooke: He was just like hey cuz. I'm like no! No! Nobody does that who are you?
Lindsey: Stop. Ryden is telling her family that she already has an interview at perspective publishing company to which she just says that she'll take an apartment in LA that she absolutely cannot afford as a new LA college grad without a job presumably by herself. But on the way to the interview a truck, a giant truck, t-bones their car and then drives away, and then upon no other consequences Ryden just runs to her interview anyway.
Brooke: I have so many things to say. One like in my notes I was taking notes during the scene where she was looking at the apartment and literally goes I'm just trying to imagine how expensive a place like that would cost and then-
Lindsey: Oh it’s a one bedroom?
Brooke: It’s a one bedroom.
Lindsey: Three thousand?
Brooke: No that 3500 is first, last, and security deposit combined.
Lindsey: No. no, not even in 2009.
Brooke: That’s what I was like. Like that is a downtown apartment. Looks amazing. And then I was like wait did that many just say that the check for first, last, and security deposit is 3500 like that’s barely more than 1000 a month. No way. No way I refuse. And then my next not is getting into a wreck like that is kind of realistic for LA.
Lindsey: I will say since moving to DC I know more people that have been hit by cars than like literally any other time in my life.
Brooke: Like pedestrians?
Lindsey: Either pedestrians or on bikes.
Brooke: Oh my god.
Lindsey: Next scene, she's at the interview which they are running 2 hours behind for and all of the applicants are literally in one room, like no workplace is that inefficient and also has all of the first interviews in person. But like, whatever.
Brooke: Yeah I mean I've been interviews where there's been like five of us in the lobby.
Lindsey: But 30 and running 2 hours behind?
Brooke: Yeah I think it's, it weirdly reminds me of like a casting call. Like that’s what a casting call looks like where they are running 2 hours behind and everyones there in the room. Like you feel uncomfortable, you feel like you're trying to measure yourself up, like this is really weird. Like I wonder if the writer has a background in casting.
Lindsey: And not assistants for publishing houses.
Brooke: Yeah exactly.
Lindsey: Ryden says that she deserves to get the job because she is a fuckboy who loves Catcher and the Rye and Bukowski more than hanging out with her friends.
Brooke: That’s very fair.
Lindsey: Upon not getting the job she tells the landlord, who obviously rejects her for lying about having a job that she can get one because quote, she is a college grad, which one ha, two at least she's trying, Ben. Next scene Ryden and Adam wallow in their sorrows at the grocery store to a series of uncomfortable events. First off Ryden tries Adams favorite ice cream, which is really just a Klondike bar but they call it something weird throughout this entire movie. This Klondike bar is the “Sound of Silence” equivalent of this movie. But when Ryden’s like its good Adams like that’s not good enough so she does this like fake sexual explanation to which Adam says that’s the girl I fell in love with but only harbors platonic feelings for me and then holds her foot and gives it a massage and also were not here for telling someone that you want to be friends and having them constantly bring up that you don’t reciprocate their feelings that’s not what a friend does.
Brooke: No it is not.
Lindsey: Ryden is a little uncomfortable but then the tension is broken when they hear people yelling and it turns out that the dad is with the cashier at the store, which just weird power dynamics all around the set of-
Brooke: Yes.
Lindsey: Ryden moves into her parents house, which is covered in garden gnomes for seemingly no addressed reason but I love it. Her dad, who is a knock-off version of Michael Keaton, so I just call him Michael Keaton the rest of the time.
Brooke: He is Michael Keaton what?
Lindsey: It is?
Brooke: Yes!
Lindsey: Wait. I call Adams dad knock-off J.K. Simmons that’s not J.K. Simmons right?
Brooke: It is.
Lindsey: Wow my joke this whole thing is actually just a truth. They don’t quite look like him.
Brooke: No this cast is stacked. Just like incredible cast for such a mediocre movie. Imagine someone referring to you as knock-off Lindsey Buttel.
Lindsey: Her dad, who is Michael Keaton, tries to fix her broken car despite never fixing a car before. And then when stepping in poop while trying to move Ryden’s furniture back inside. He angrily runs to the neighbors house who happens to be hot so Ryden is less mad about having to be home, presumably. And also was like this is the third time I've stepped in your cat's poop which also like wouldn’t you be like a little more careful where you step? Apparently not.
Brooke: Nope. It's his property. Cats shouldn’t poop there.
Lindsey: There's then a montage of Ryden applying to jobs and riding, ha, her bike in full business clothes to these jobs which first off LA is spread out. Like presumably there's some scenes of her getting on the bus but like-
Brooke: Yeah. She takes cabs.
Lindsey: You're riding in your clothes. Like go there in workout clothes, take a weird sink bath and then change. But she has no idea what she's doing at any of these interviews like one woman straight up was like tell me one thing you like that our company does and she wasn’t able to answer because she didn’t know what the company did.
Brooke: Yeah. On her table of job hunting, like the kitchen table that she takes over, one of the flyers was, it literally reads like a casting call but just like women 18-25 only. And I was like what jobs is she applying for? Like where did they get that flyer?
Lindsey: This was just written by a casting director. There's an entire side plot of the brother wanting to enter a boxcar race which they use the casket for because Ryden breaks one and they have to buy it, which I kind of ignore this entire side plot.
Brooke: The coffin is this movie’s scuba diving.
Lindsey: Next scene Michael Keaton suggests that instead of looking for a job that Ryden should go into the belt buckle industry and that she should do it with him. It also cuts to scenes of Adam refusing to open his law school letter from Columbia. Presumably because Ryden won't be in New York and he doesn’t just want to do what his dad wants him to do. I had his dad is also an off-brand J.K. Simmons.
Brooke: I can't believe you did that.
Lindsey: Which is just convenient because I always get J.K. Simmons and Michael Keaton confused with each other. But apparently I just get them confused with themselves.
Brooke: Yeah I also said that buckles is this movie’s plastic.
Lindsey: In the next scene Ryden and Adam go to a party presumably like a month after graduation if that.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: At like maybe only a few weeks. But everyone has a job or is going to grad schools like the next semester as if that’s realistic. And then the valedictorian gives her shit for being unemployed. Like legit a month after graduation.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: In 2009. In that economy.
Brooke: I mean even in today's economy. I didn’t get a paying in-industry job for like 7 months after I graduated and I wasn’t alone and no one was judging me and like when I got that job it wasn’t like oh my god finally. It was like oh wow cool like you got a job. It's not like she like majored in something that was an instant career maker. Like it wasn’t engineering or something that like people approach you before you graduate.
Lindsey: Yeah. Or like one of the ones where you have to apply to super early.
Brooke: Yeah like accounting and gross things like that.
Lindsey: It turns out that Adam doesn’t want to go or is unsure about going to law school because his band has a gig. And as a parallel scene to the graduate into which Mrs. Robinson is like Ben I need to tell you this thing but you have to come over really close for me to be able to tell it to you, he makes Ryden go creepily close to him on the diving board because it’s quote on quote a secret and then shouts that his band got a gig.
Brooke: I would have pushed Adam in.
Lindsey: Same. But he tells Ryden that she's lucky because she knows what she wants to do. Dude you're also like 22, you don’t need to do that. Unless what you want to do is quit your job and fly across the country for some dude who isn’t even your real friend, in which case that is the wrong decision of knowing what you want to do. Also Ben’s decision was the wrong decision of doing something regardless of not knowing what you want to do. Anyway all of these movies are you don’t need to know what you want to do you just cannot do these two things.
Brooke: You don’t need to know what you want to do but don’t do that.
Lindsey: Next scene Michael Keaton supposedly gets into a pyramid belt buckle scheme and tells Ryden that she can do the marketing. Upon being told that she quote isn’t trying hard enough after like a month? A week? We don’t know, her dad makes her work at the luggage company, which also fuck him. She's been going to so many interviews?
Brooke: Yeah. Like it would be one thing if she was sitting in a pool and being gone from midnight to noon every day.
Lindsey: Quote on quote driving.
Brooke: Yeah then you can be like you're not trying. But she's going on interviews. She's actively trying to do things.
Lindsey: He tries showing her how to sell the luggage and tells her not to be too slutty while showing it off but you need to be a little slutty so you can sell, which okay. Dad. Her nemesis then walks in saying that her new publishing job is already sending her to New York for a conference, which after a week? Month? Your lowest ranking employee would not happen but okay. Regardless, Ryden quits in frustration. In the next scene the dad quote on quote fixes the bumper or the engine or whatever was even wrong with the car but instead makes it reverse at great speeds and not be able to stop and makes the door fall off consequently killing the hot neighbor’s cat and then blaming Ryden for not warning him. But the dad goes to tell the neighbor, but as he's going he gets mad because instead of stepping in the cat's poop he steps in the squashed cat which was a detail none of us needed.
Brooke: Nope.
Lindsey: But to tell the neighbor Michael Keaton just opens the door, says ‘cats dead,’ and that’s it. Then I don’t know if this was the neighbor idea or if it was a joke that Michael Keaton was playing but they play “Memory” from Cats as they bury the cat’s body in the neighbors backyard. Ryden then apologizes for the cat and hot neighbor is like no need. Actually let's eat pancakes and invites Ryden into his entirely grey apartment covered in a bunch of shit from infomercials that he got for free as the director of infomercials. And his couch is a plastic inflatable see through couch and Ryden laughs and smiles as if she's impressed.
Brooke: It's 2009. It was a simpler time.
Lindsey: Seemingly completely unphased that his cat just died, he and Ryden drink wine and then he stars at her like a murderer, like Twilight, and offers Ryden a pa gig on set and tells her that now that she doesn’t have a job to worry about, she should focus on the positives. Like the fact that she doesn’t have quote tragic ears, end quote, and they make out.
Brooke: Yep, immediately after hiring her he makes out with her. Problematic.
Lindsey: These movies are all about problematic relationships. They’re the tips and tricks of what not to do when you're unsure about things and what relationships are not okay.
Brooke: Yes.
Lindsey: The family comes back with cookies and then they state that they hear Ryden moaning in the living room and they're like Ryden must be here. A why do you know her moans, Bb why are you like okay, we must go in.
Brooke: Well I think they say Ryden must be there before they hear the moans.
Lindsey: Oh I thought they like heard noise of her being in there.
Brooke: No I think the grandma was like oh where's Ryden and they said oh she's probably paying her respects and then they hear monas and then Michael Keaton like runs in, what's his daughter fraternizing with a man 12 years older.
Lindsey: Michael Keaton then confronts Ryden and is like did you use protection and she was like dad we were like fully clothed and obviously not having sex in that moment at least to which he in Pig Latin says to stay away from the hot neighbors quote doodle, end quote. Also turns out that Michael Keaton's belts were stolen from a professional belt guy, apparently, which is better than the multilevel marketing scheme that I thought it was? Next scene Ryden is shopping and makes Adam hold all of her clothes and then he sings to her outside of the dressing room about how we once tried to kiss her and Ryden was like please stop. And in theory he's doing this to impress the cashier, maybe, we don’t know? But Adam like do you hear yourself? Like?
Brooke: Yeah. Like it is perfectly fine to be like oh I liked you at one point, I tried to pursue it, now we're just friends that’s cool. But like to hold onto those feelings and be like maybe one day she's realize? Like that’s fucked. Like no you can't do that. Like that’s not being her friend, that’s being creepy.
Lindsey: And like to continuously hit on her and see that she's uncomfortable.
Brooke: Stop that sir.
Lindsey: He then proceeds to say that they should celebrate him getting his gig by very obviously asking Ryden on a date but trying to disguise it as like not a date.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: Which like all of the evidence points to please stop asking her out.
Brooke: Yep.
Lindsey: Next scene Ryden is on, I don’t know if the neighbor was ever named so I just call him hot neighbor the entire time
Brooke: Yeah I don’t know his name. Lets see what IMDB says hang on. His name is David Santiago.
Lindsey: Okay. I can call him David.
Brooke: No please don’t.
Lindsey: Next scene, next scene Ryden is on hot neighbor’s set for infomercials. And the infomercial is critiqued as needing quote, more interesting shots, like in the style of The Matrix. Feel like they could have said in The Graduate but that would have been on the nose.
Brooke: You know this has nothing to do, like this isn’t a remake of The Graduate right? This has nothing to do with The Graduate.
Lindsey: It is. Too many things are the same. Why would you make her be interested in her older neighbor. It’s the same.
Brooke: It's not the same but okay.
Lindsey: Okay also if The Graduate is like the cinematography movie TM as it is claimed to be, then that would have just made sense logically as to what they wanted.
Brooke: Yeah but there wasn’t special effects like that famous scene in The Matrix. That is also a held up scene for special effects and liked dramatic elements.
Lindsey: That fair. Not needed for a disgusting machine where you put a whole avocado in-
Brooke: Yeah that’s kind of the point. He also I mean he also quit because of racism.
Lindsey: That’s fair.
Brooke: I mean I am pro quitting because of racist people.
Lindsey: They told him that they needed more interesting shots like in the style of The Matrix and that it needs to be quote more Mexican and then just says problematic things, which makes him quit on the stop and which also makes Ryden quit. He literally just grabs her arm and makes her leave.
Brooke: I know.
Lindsey: Meanwhile Adam buys Ryden flowers at the store.
Brooke: And socks.
Lindsey: And socks for her quote cold feet. Throwback to him touching them at the beginning of the movie. But hot neighbor and Ryden go to the beach and miss Adam’s show where he sings a song about him not being able to tell Ryden how he's in love with her because it's quote hard for him to show his heart, though like has very obviously shown his heart the whole movie and we all know that he's in love with her and he has told her that multiple times. Maybe not in those exact words.
Brooke: Yeah. He thinks he hasn’t shown his heart because she doesn’t reciprocate.
Lindsey: Adam waits for Ryden at her house after she misses the show just to be like it’s not a big deal and acts very passive aggressive and leaves and then gets mad that he's in love with her and she doesn’t reciprocate and like cares about finding a job, which granted Ryden is very self-centered, but also like finding a job is a very important thing for her to do at this time in her life.
Brooke: Yeah. Much like Elaine finding out about Mrs. Robinson ruined their relationship, Adam finding out about the next door neighbor ruined their relationship.
Lindsey: Ha! Cause it’s the same.
Brooke: It’s the same.
Lindsey: Adam then says that he's not waiting anymore, which like okay cool she told you not to hit on her and then he says that he doesn’t want her in her future at all because if he can’t fuck her then they cant continue to be friends.
Brooke: Which like should have been established at the beginning of their friendship when she said I will never fuck you and he said okay.
Lindsey: Immediately after Michael Keaton gets arrested for quote on quote stealing the belt buckles. The next conversation-
Brooke: Is this, wait-
Lindsey: -movie
Brooke: I was gonna say is this pro cop propaganda?
Lindsey: I said that this is not pro cop propaganda cause they arrest Michael Keaton for a crime that he didn’t commit. They went after Michael Keaton, not the person actually like distributing the stolen goods, and they held him first without bail, then for $15K or he had to stay in jail until the trial. Which a good fuck you to the legal system and not an encouragement of it.
Brooke: That’s such a high bail.
Lindsey: Yup! For just like-
Brooke: For having stolen goods.
Lindsey: Yeah however, the grandma bails out Michael Keaton and asks if they wanted a check or cash in that moment which like apparently she just had $15K on her?
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: So I guess not insane? I don't know? In the next scene the publishing company also apparently fired the other person for like 2 weeks? 2 months? Don’t know, regardless offers Ryden the job. Adam has been ignoring her so Ryden drives an ice cream truck to his pickup basketball game and Adam again says it's all good and then is very passive aggressive and he's decided that he's going to Columbia and is leaving the next day. To which i was like is this the fall? Is he leaving early? Did summer happen we don’t know?
Brooke: Yep.
Lindsey: Ryden offers him ice cream, to which he declines, and none of the other people playing basketball even though there's only four which she can totally swing. Next scene Ryden goes to her first day of work and they tell her that the old person aka Rydens nemesis, aka Jessica was fired because she acted like she was quote, running the company, and also made herself the background of her computer that they presumably didn’t reset before they gave it to Ryden.
Brooke: Yeah. I like, that makes me laugh so much because the idea of someone like going to my computer and having my background. My background on my computer is an out of context Good Place screenshot. It’s the scene with Jason and one of his Florida friends being like you got dreams in life? That’s lit. Like the idea of-
Lindsey: Is that pillboy? Is that his name?
Brooke: Yeah. But the idea of a new assistant getting that computer and being greeted with you got dreams in life? That’s lit. It's really funny to me.
Lindsey: I love that. Instead of seemingly training Ryden her boss is like you know you need to do X as part of your job? Right? As if they explained anything to her and she didn’t just log in for her first day 5 minutes ago. But there's the montage of her doing typical assistant stuff like staying late reading submissions and doing her boss’ bitch work.
Brooke: Yeah. I will say I haven’t watched this movie since becoming an assistant myself and I was like yeah I've done every single one of these things except getting gum off of my boss’ shoe. Like I haven't one that but everything else, check.
Lindsey: Next scene Ryden comes home from work and sits on hot neighbors couch in the pool because again it’s a fucking inflatable couch. But he says that he's moving to Brazil because quote work isn’t everything. And I haven’t spoken to my family in I don’t know how long and I realized that I needed some sort of human connection outside of my fucking job of directing infomercials. Which this is such an extreme. Like get a job and make friends. You can do both. You don’t need to fly across the country for someone who wore you down until you finally decide to date them but that’s a spoiler for five minutes from now. I man like I guess your family’s different. But in a matter of Ryden like hearing this advice and being like I can only be friends with Adam. I understand now.
Brooke: I understand. I don’t care about my dream job. I need Adam.
Lindsey: Ryden takes the advice to mean I can't find more people to love. I guess this is what I got and tells her family that she's quitting her job and moving to new York, to which Michael Keaton is supportive but also like you have a like good job at a notable publishing company like just stay there a year to et like leverage and then move to a different publishing company in New York.
Brooke: Yep. Which is a much smarter plan.
Lindsey: Also you don’t know if Adam forgives you.
Brooke: Yeah similar to The Graduate after one date she's going to Adams college even though he has made no intention of wanting to ever speak to her again.
Lindsey: Arguably they didn’t even go on that one date because she was with hot neighbor.
Brooke: Yeah that’s fair.
Lindsey: Regardless she gets there and apparently just walks into Columbia's law school dorms and knows where Adam lives in the largest dorm in the world and is like life sucks without you, I miss you even though it has been, again an unknown amount of time since she has last seen him.
Brooke: But we had a montage so we know at least some time has passed.
Lindsey: Yeah but like all of those things could have happened in a day at her job.
Brooke: I mean they didn’t because she was wearing different outfits but.
Lindsey: That’s fair. But like a week? Two weeks? Three weeks? A month? We don’t know?
Brooke: Yeah we don’t know that.
Lindsey: But he's filling out, I guess a maintenance request could happen at any time.
Brooke: Yeah.
Lindsey: I assumed that was like the opening thing that like you give your RA the paper of like these are the things that’s wrong with my dorm, don’t charge me.
Brooke: I think it was like a thing broke in my room. Please come look at it.
Lindsey: Yeah, but Ryden’s like oh I realized I'm in love with you which seems fake but whatever. Uh and then realizes that there's a woman in the room and she's like oh I should have called. To which Adam is like she's my RA, but also like what if she weren’t his RA? Like where were you gonna stay Ryden? Like what? What was the backup plan? You already quit your job. But they kiss, I don’t know why, I don’t think many things changed with Ryden, maybe she’s worn out and settling whose to say but the whole family tells her that they hope that she is having protected sex over the phone and then they announce that they're coming to visit. End movie.
Brooke: And much like The Graduate it ends on a note of uncertainty because Adam’s like wait, the whole family? And suddenly he's regretting it.
Lindsey: Stares off into the distance. I now have what I want and now I don’t want it!
[Scarborough Fair Transition Music]
Brooke: Linds.
Lindsey: Yeah.
Brooke: Which did you like more? The Graduate or Post Grad?
Lindsey: I feel like I like Post Grad more just because The Graduate offended me on like a lot of levels. And like sure it was prettier but like I wouldn’t like I wouldn’t feel good about myself if I were like, like if i were like I'm gonna sit down and watch this. It’s not because I'm like okay. You know?
Brooke: Yeah. See like that's the thing is I don’t think I could bring myself to rewatch Post Grad. Because that made me more angry. Like The Graduate made me uncomfortable, Post Grad made me angry.
Lindsey: But like I'm fine, not that I necessarily watch things to like feel happy or not be uncomfortable, like I love things with like bittersweet endings or like secondhand uncomfortableness but it’s like uncomfortable in a way that like they thought it was fine.
Brooke: Yeah it was an unintended uncomfortableness.
Lindsey: Yeah.
Brooke: It wasn’t like the filmmakers being like hey.
Lindsey: Which like I don’t want to actively put myself through. And like I thought Post Grad was whatever but I had fun watching J.K. Simmons and Michael doing some weird stuff.
Brooke: Even though you had no idea that it was J.K. Simmons and Michael Keaton?
Lindsey: In retrospect, fun times. Belts.
Brooke: Belts?
Lindsey: I was entertained enough and I didn’t hate myself.
Brooke: Yeah again like I like The Graduate for everything but the plot. If you ignore the plot it’s a good movie.
Lindsey: I can't. I can't ignore the plot.
Brooke: I know it's so much of the movie is the plot. It’s a shame how that works. You know? Just give me a plot, no. don’t give me a plotless movie I hate-
Lindsey: I was gonna say are we really saying that?
Brooke: Like those arthouse short films that make no sense I feel like my eyes are bleeding out of my head, no I don’t want that.
Lindsey: I feel like I'd rather that than The Graduate. I'd rather no plot and like cry blood than-
Brooke: Than watch The Graduate again? Okay then. That’s a very firm stance.
Lindsey: Well that is The Graduate and Post Grad. Thank you for listening.
Brooke: Yeah share this episode with, who should they share it with this week? Their neighbor they find weirdly attractive but probably shouldn’t?
Lindsey: Yeah and then your neighbors’ children who you also find attractive?
Brooke: Also follow us on social media, we are at @filmsquidspod on Facebook, Instagram, and twitter.
Lindsey: Or visit us at our website at filmkidsgiantsquids.com.
Brooke: Film Kids, Giant Squids is produced and hosted by Brooke Hoppe and Lindsey Buttel. Theme music is by the band Poly Action. Transition music is by kongr45gpen. Editing by Brooke Hoppe. Until next time, kids.