Cat People (Halloween)

Clare and BDM talk Metropolitan, Whit Stillman's 1990 comedy of manners, with special guest John Ganz of Unpopular Front and Unclear and Present Danger. Discussed: Upper East Side childhoods, Whit Stillman and Lena Dunham, and manners.

This should have been up much earlier, but it was not! Clare, BDM, and producer Austin talk Patrick McHale's Over the Garden Wall. How is it perfect? Why is it perfect? These and other issues are investigated at length.

When women tell you they're a big cat, believe them…. BDM and Clare talk Val Lewton and Jacques Tourneur's 1942 masterpiece Cat People, a movie about how Americans know nothing and psychologists have to die. Also discussed: animal brides. Not discussed: "Cat Person," but Patreon subscribers can look forward to a little treat on that front. https://www.patreon.com/stetpod

Stet returns! Clare and BDM talk Scream, a movie one likes and the other hates. Discussed topics: Why Death is your boyfriend, how Rose McGowan wuz robbed, how men in Woodsboro can't make normal facial expressions, and the limits of being meta about the stuff you just want to do anyway.

BDM and Clare watch Incident at Loch Ness, a Zak Penn/Werner Herzog documentary about the making of a documentary that collided with another documentary. "Tell me, who is real and who is not?" Herzog pleads… but we'll never tell. Then in the second half there is discussion of Olivia Rodrigo, the passage of time, the fickleness of memory, whether or not getting over something is possible, internet churn, children getting older while we're getting older too. Full show notes: https://www.patreon.com/stetpod

Welcome to THAT ESCALATED QUICKLY, a theme dedicated to movies that start in one genre and end in another. Our first movie is After Hours, which begins as a movie about a guy looking for a plaster of paris bagel and cream cheese paperweight and ends… well… as one. BDM and Clare bring on their second guest, novelist Austin Grossman, to discuss Martin Scorsese's weird, beautiful 1985 masterpiece. The drinking-while-recording policy produces some predictable consequences. Clare talks about her dad's experiences bartending in Manhattan around the same period as the movie. Martin Scorsese, if you're reading come on the pod; we promise we won't get drunk that time. Full notes at: https://www.patreon.com/stetpod

Special guest Dawn Foster comes on to talk John Patrick Shanley's mystifying 2020 movie, Wild Mountain Thyme. Is it a good movie? No. Is it the best movie where Emily Blunt pretends to be Irish? Maybe. Is it the best movie where Jamie Dornan fails to sound Irish, despite actually being Irish? We've got to say yes. Check out the Patreon here: https://www.patreon.com/stetpod

BDM and Clare talk about Yoshifumi Kondō's Whisper of the Heart (1995). Is this a movie about a boy who is also a magical cat? No, but one of us thinks it is. For full show notes, check out https://www.patreon.com/stetpod

Clare and BDM talk about Bernard Rose's 1989 film Paperhouse (along with its source material, Catherine Storr's 1964 Marianne Dreams). Is it a horror movie? Is it a children's movie? Do the police need to be called on somebody? Then after the break they dig into Taylor Swift's rerelease and rerecording of her breakout album, Fearless. For full show notes, check out the Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/stetpod Where to watch Paperhouse: https://www.justwatch.com/us/movie/paperhouse Buy Marianne Dreams: https://www.biblio.com/9780571231454 Ebert and Siskel review (sampled): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yxf6QCKAUI Hans Zimmer score: https://open.spotify.com/album/05n2sAFh19JiO1L7rwKbEI?si=jpJW46_1THeu4gEQ5DrI5A Clip from Escape Into Night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4eiJ9cKS5Ac "'I Write to Frighten Myself': Catherine Storr and the Development of Children's Literature Studies in Britain," Kimberley Reynolds https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10583-017-9339-1 "Fear and evil in children's books" Catherine Storr https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2FBF01140654 Fearless (Taylor's Version) https://open.spotify.com/album/4hDok0OAJd57SGIT8xuWJH?si=gTRFQL7UQcyvyINCSktcrg "The decadence of Taylor Swift's re-recorded record," Mary Kate Skehan https://spectator.us/book-and-art/decadence-taylor-swift-record-fearless/

Clare and BDM take a trip to New Penzance to discuss Wes Anderson's 2012 romantic drama, Moonrise Kingdom. Then they scrutinize a recent piece in Slate making the case for pandemic shaming. Along the way, they fail to pronounce any names correctly. Subscribe to our Patreon to teach us how to talk: https://www.patreon.com/stetpod Some pieces mentioned in detail or in passing: "In Support of Shame," Kendra Pierre-Louis (https://slate.com/technology/2021/04/shame-covid-restrictions-psychology-public-health.html) "Shaming / not shaming," BDM (https://notebook.substack.com/p/shaming-not-shaming) "Scabs: Academics and Others Who Write for Free," Yasmin Nair (https://www.thecut.com/2020/12/people-tell-me-i-seem-like-a-snob-whenever-im-quiet.html)