Shopgirl And The Weight Of Loneliness

He sends her a pair of gloves from her own workplace and somehow that becomes the beginning of everything. We’re talking about Shopgirl (2005), the Steve Martin adaptation that looks like a romance on the surface but lands as a sharp, quiet story about depression, loneliness, and the way relationships can distort identity when you’re desperate to feel seen. 

We walk through Mirabelle (Claire Danes) as a glove saleswoman at Saks Fifth Avenue who feels like she’s fading out of her own life, then dig into the film’s most telling details: her self-erasure artwork, the emptiness of routine in Los Angeles, and the emotional math that makes a “kept” role feel safer than being alone. From there we contrast Ray’s controlled distance with Jeremy’s clumsy sincerity, and why both connections can miss the mark in different ways. 

A major thread is mental health and medication adherence. When Mirabelle stops her antidepressants, the movie shows how fast the floor can drop out, especially when love and stability are already shaky. We also talk about how different viewers bring different lenses to a film, why this story can feel brutal if you’ve lived around depression or addiction, and why the ending is so complicated that you may even feel a little bad for the person you expected to blame. 

If you like film analysis podcasts, relationship psychology, and honest conversations about depression in movies, hit play. Subscribe, share this with a friend who loves character-driven films, and leave a review with your take: is Ray tragic, selfish, or both?

Transcript

Memorial Day Opening

SPEAKER_00 0:01

Hey, happy frickin' memorial day. You know what I did today?

SPEAKER_04 0:08

What did you do today?

SPEAKER_00 0:10

Napped. Not a lot. And ate. And slept in. It was pretty good.

SPEAKER_04 0:16

Did you have a nice nap?

SPEAKER_00 0:17

I did. But woke up too early. But we had to get to the stuff. This week was your pick. It was. Something we had both seen but wanted a refresher on. Uh, you want to take us through it? Yeah. Alright, go to it.

SPEAKER_04 0:37

Um, I chose the movie Shop Girl from 2005. Um, it's based on a novella written by Steve Martin. Yes, that's Steve Martin. Um. And to sum it up very quickly.

SPEAKER_00 0:55

Well, who was in it?

SPEAKER_04 0:56

Oh, um, well, Steve Martin and

Why Shopgirl And Who Stars

SPEAKER_04 1:00

Claire Danes playing the play the main characters, I would say. Jason Jason Schwartzman plays Jeremy. Jeremy. Claire Danes played. Steve Martin plays. Steve Martin plays Ray. Yeah. And Claire Danes plays Mirabelle.

SPEAKER_00 1:16

And Jason Schwartzman, interesting side note, is the son or nephew of Talia Shire.

SPEAKER_04 1:25

Who's Talia Shire?

SPEAKER_00 1:27

Adrian from the Rocky movies. Which I never saw. I don't see words for it. She was also in The Godfather. She was uh Michael Corleone's sister. She's she's a big name. But from more previous to my generation. But she's been in the movie business for a long time. Uh I can't remember her name in the anyone who's in the movies is hating this right now that I don't remember her name. But she was the Michael's sister in uh she was the one who got smacked around. She married some guy in the first godfather and get smacked around, but I Schwartzman was Oh, she was married to Jack Schwartzmann. So that's her son. Yeah. Jack Schwartzman was a producer who also did that BMX movie I was so fond uh fond of as a kid. Rad. Which have nothing to do with this movie. Anyway.

SPEAKER_04 2:34

She's a member of the quir of the Coppola family? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:37

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 2:39

She's best known for her roles as Connie.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

Connie, that's it.

SPEAKER_04 2:44

Okay. Wow, I've never heard of her. Sorry, Talia.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Solid IMDB work there.

SPEAKER_04 2:52

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

So back to our movie. Yeah, we uh clinical perspectives categorize the movie as a depiction of depressive disorders.

SPEAKER_04 3:04

Which Well, first I think we should give a little synopsis to explain that. Go to it. Um it's based again, like we said, on Steve Martin's novella, also titled Shop Girl. And Claire Danes' character, Mirabel, is a lonely and depressed glove sales woman at Saks Fifth Avenue. And she just like stands behind a behind a counter all day and you know hopes that there'll be

Loneliness And Self-Erasure Art

SPEAKER_04 3:40

some kind of customer interaction that maybe somebody will buy a pair of super expensive fancy gloves and goes back to her apartment and just does the same thing every day. Wouldn't you say?

SPEAKER_00 3:52

Yeah, but the one through the slide deck that you put together, she practices a coping coping mechanism called self-erasure. I saw that, I looked it up. Yeah, she she's an artist and she shows in galleries, but on medium, she photographs herself and then kind of obscures the the image of herself. So it's you can't make out a lot of features, and then she surrounds it with etchings in charcoal. So it's it's interesting work, but it's a reflection of how she doesn't have much of an identity. She just kind of exists.

SPEAKER_04 4:35

Yeah. And she does. No, that's it. I was just gonna say, and she does one like every six months, she said. So it's not a regular thing, and sometimes she says that they sell it the gallery, but I think like you were saying, she just does them it's almost like a self-preservation kind of.

SPEAKER_00 4:55

Yeah, it's some kind of odd personal therapy.

SPEAKER_04 4:58

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

Where was I with the um it's funny because when we built this or when you built the slide deck, it spends a lot of the entire slide deck is at least the sources that you pulled were built around understanding different forms of psychopathy in cinema.

SPEAKER_05 5:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:25

And I'm curious how much this would be an interesting interview for Steve Martin, just to say, you know, hey, we do this podcast and all the sources that we pulled referenced and built conversations or our conversation around psychopathy and uh psychological disorders in film. How much of that went into the novella that you wrote? Were were you thinking about somebody who was dealing with depression, or did it become like an offshoot to the story? Because all of our sources, and you pulled how many, like ten?

SPEAKER_05 6:06

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Referenced there was even one section of the slide deck that had an XY axis in terms of how much information is relay regarding the psychological disorder in that movie and how relevant it is to understanding the disease.

SPEAKER_05 6:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:32

And it gave different they called them psi ratings. Like for example, I'll see if I can pull this one up pretty quick. Yeah. I don't know what's happening when I try to pull these up, it's not grabbing the one I want. So I gotta go through all the slides. Yeah, it it doesn't,

Psychology Ratings For Movies

SPEAKER_00 6:50

it doesn't do it right. So Psy 1 is a depiction for providing your information only. Don't bother with the film. It's just kind of a it's referenced. And then like Psy 3 is a good film relevant to your education as a mental health professional. And then Psi V would be a musty film that combines artistry with psychological relevance. And Shopgirl was they classified it as a two.

SPEAKER_05 7:19

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:21

Again, we didn't read the novella, but there are things about Mirabelle that it's so interesting when we build these because you see it, but to have the AI put it into words and to and to create a sketch around the characters and what they're dealing with, and the elements in the movie that reference back to what that character is thinking and how they process information is really it's really fascinating. Like, for example, the clinical state, it talks about Mirabella as being currently prescribed antidepressants. You don't really find this out, you just see her as I'd say for like the first 20-30 minutes, it's a single woman living in LA, kind of trying to find her way. She meets a guy, she meets Jason Schwartzman, who is emotionally available but emotionally immature.

SPEAKER_02 8:30

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 8:32

And then she gets. That he sends her a pair of gloves from her shop that she buys.

SPEAKER_05 9:00

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 9:01

That like, just on the surface level, like, why would you send me gloves from my own job? That's just kind of a weak gift. It's like I you don't. It does kind of underpin him as a person that he doesn't, he hasn't really spent the time to get to know her.

SPEAKER_01 9:20

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 9:21

He just sends her something from work. And then how do you get her address? You and I went back and forth about this. He does?

unknown 9:36

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

What was it?

SPEAKER_04 9:39

He like did some sleuthing in behind the scenes figuring out. But it's still odd.

SPEAKER_00 9:47

Especially like in 2026, every any woman under the age of 40 would be saying stalker.

SPEAKER_04 9:59

Well, and I think when you're first watching the movie, the initial time you watch it. I mean, not knowing anything, and he comes into the store and he buys the gloves and he has a conversation with her about um which pair should he buy, and she asks him, like, who they're for, what's the occasion, or what's the dress, the color of the dresses, or something. And so you kind of think like, oh, he's buying them for, you know, a wife or uh some other bird. Some other person, and yeah, then it just like the next scene shows up on her doorstep. That was always kind of surprising.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

Which just tells you that he's been he'd had his eye on her. Well, I guess it doesn't have to be. He's been watching her for a while, but he comes up with this impromptu method to connect with her. And on some level, it's smooth because his note is very direct and to the point, mature in that regard.

Gloves Gift And First Impressions

SPEAKER_00 11:05

Just, I want to have dinner with you.

SPEAKER_05 11:07

Yeah. That's yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:10

Yeah, which is it's an older man's move. It's a straight to the point, you're either into it or you're not. And then Jason Schwartzman is he just calls her up to hook up with her. But does and is this terrible that we have a movie podcast, and I don't even know how to describe what a an emotional and interpersonal klutz he is. He's just not, he's nice, he's a nice kid. And you can tell he wants to get to know this person, but he doesn't know how to relate to other people, especially not rom especially not a member of the opposite sex romantically.

SPEAKER_05 11:58

Yeah. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 12:01

And then what I want again, I told you before we started this, I wasn't uh I was gonna try not to overtake the conversation, but where does it go from so they get together, Maribel and Ray, and then so they have a romance. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 12:24

And I'm not sure what you were going through.

SPEAKER_00 12:28

Well, I was just I was gonna have you take us through take us through the rest of the movie.

SPEAKER_04 12:33

So they have a romance and So sh so he gets her these gloves, and that turns into, you know, more like I think they're both needing and wanting a relationship. But they have that conversation about wanting to be in a relationship, but the idea of being in a relationship for both parties, if you will, is different. Yeah, he does share a partner to be there to love her. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 13:03

And she And they have that they have that that vignette. We're not I don't know if it's quite a vignette, but he's talking to his therapist and she's talking to her friends about the same conversation.

SPEAKER_05 13:15

Yep. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 13:16

And he says, Oh yeah, I told her it's just sexual.

Ray Versus Jeremy On Connection

SPEAKER_00 13:20

It's not it's not going anywhere. And when she's talking to her friend, she says. I I'm deferring to you. Sorry.

SPEAKER_04 13:31

I just was trying to think of what to say. Yeah. Um she makes it sound like they're in the beginning of a relationship and it's something very serious, and that he, correct me if I'm wrong, but does love her and or is getting there. I don't know how you'd say that. Yeah. Um It's going somewhere. Yeah. It's not just like it's progressing. There you go. It's not just like a surface thing.

SPEAKER_00 13:55

And as he's talking to his psychologist, he's He's almost self-affirming that yeah, she understands it's just sexual and that's it.

SPEAKER_04 14:08

Yeah. I also think it's really interesting because you brought up like he's talking to Ray's talking to his psychologist, and um Mirabel is talking to her friends at work. She actually doesn't really have any friends at work. She's like kind of a loner. She comes into work, she goes to her position.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Yeah, these are like people she lunch with or something.

SPEAKER_04 14:27

So I just I just always think that's interesting because they're like they see something in her that something has happened at work, some kind of relationship with with the mystery person, and they're like, let's all go out to dinner.

SPEAKER_00 14:41

Yeah, it's like the it's it's almost like I've told you about this about LA. It's sort of a city of vampires, and that they notice like, hey, there's a change in you, you're happier, you're wearing that dress. Where'd you get you get that dress from work, and you're you have a certain what there's something about your walk, your head, your chin is up, you're smiling, you're something is different. Yeah, and we want to know what it is, grab onto it.

SPEAKER_04 15:07

Yeah, and what can we have a piece of it?

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Even that quote unquote friend of hers tries to hook up with Ray Porter.

SPEAKER_05 15:16

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 15:18

But that that's a that comically misfires and to another character's benefit, and you gotta you gotta admit, that's uh that's that was kind of a nice thing to see.

SPEAKER_04 15:34

Yes, it was. It was I didn't think that well, I don't want to give it away. Yeah, I guess, so I won't say anything else about that, but okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:45

Um The progression though, you you're almost waiting for like what's the not the foil, but the what's the antagonist to this story, and then you see her throw away pills, and you start to wonder.

SPEAKER_04 16:04

That's a big part of it.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Yeah, you start to wonder, especially since she's in LA, you find out that she's from Vermont, and she's been there a while and lives by herself up in the hills, that

Stopping Antidepressants And The Spiral

SPEAKER_00 16:20

I don't think they directly reference it, but you start to wonder. This is a common thing with people who suffer from depression or other psychotic illnesses, that if they're on medication, they start to feel better and they discard they're they're like, Alright, I'm better, I'm cured now, I don't need the medication anymore, and they throw it away. Which is what she does.

SPEAKER_04 16:47

And I can't believe, but yeah, okay.

SPEAKER_00 16:49

You can't believe what.

SPEAKER_04 16:55

I mean, I can't talk because I've never been there before, but I can't believe that if you were depressed and needed to be on medication and your doctor prescribed medicine for you, and then like you said, I mean, great, it's really working for you, and then one day you're like, I don't need it anymore. Like that to me, when I see that in the movie, like I think, wouldn't her doctor have said like you always need to take this or something?

SPEAKER_00 17:24

I don't I think that's a little bit of a blur between the illnesses, like if you're de well, I don't I think I told you a while a while back I had a roommate when I lived in Chicago who was for a year he paid rent.

SPEAKER_05 17:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:46

And then inexplicably,

A Real Story About Medication

SPEAKER_00 17:48

he kind of he just dropped off the map. He was there.

SPEAKER_05 17:51

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

He would come home real light and late and leave real early, and I had to catch him and be like, hey, you're two weeks late on the rent. What's going on? Mm-hmm. And he paid part of it that next day.

SPEAKER_05 18:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:06

And then he just didn't come home. And what I found out was like he didn't come back at all. He went and lived under a bridge.

SPEAKER_04 18:16

Oh, yeah, you did. Yeah, I remember all this.

SPEAKER_00 18:18

And what I found out was, like, he was an actor and a uh and and gay and I I think that kind I think not that this is not that those two things go hand in hand, but he may have also been dealing with some kind of relationship issue. And I know he were he has he worked at some type of museum, and that job may have I don't know if it ended or what, but there was some kind of catalyst and he stopped taking his medication. Okay. And yeah, he just vanished. And I remember I bumped into him at a through the person I met him with at a there was like an outdoor concert, and he was there with this friend of mine, and he was like, hey, surprise. And I'm like, I I feel bad about this because I had said to him, I'm like, hey, you got my 600 bucks?

SPEAKER_05 19:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:26

And he was and it was really insensitive of me, and I still kind of regret it because I didn't I didn't recognize what really happened to him. I just thought he abandoned everything, and it turned out he had a psychotic episode and just went, became, mate, forced himself to become homeless. He stopped taking his meds altogether, and even his folks reached out to me and because he had stuff in storage at my place, and I'm like, I can't just keep that. I've kept I kept it for a year.

SPEAKER_05 19:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:58

But w back to the movie, Maribel is she throws out her meds, and you can see this very quickly. She just kind of descends into this depressive state. And for people who haven't had uh experience with depression, it's a it's a motherfucker. It's if you've ever been just try to imagine whenever you've been really sad about something, amplify it, and then it never dissipates. You've seen stories about people who they stay in bed all day, they can't get motivated. Yeah. And they I think the filmmakers did a pretty good job of showing that's that's kind of what happened to her.

SPEAKER_04 20:46

They really did, and it was quick. Yeah. It was fast. That's like 'cause I've seen other um sorry. Um I've seen other movies or TV about this exact same thing. And it's like well not I shouldn't say exact, but like people having depressive order disorder or bipolar disorder, and it's like so again, I can't relate because I don't know that life, but I just can't believe how good it's almost like you recognize it when it's on film.

SPEAKER_05 21:23

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

Do you remember how like shocking together? Yeah, it's like she had uh it's almost like she had an anxiety attack at work. Yeah. When she had to sit down, she starts breathing real heavy. Oh yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 21:34

Yeah, I'd forgotten about yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:35

And do you remember there's a scene when she goes home to Vermont, she's having

Vermont Visit And Mom’s Instinct

SPEAKER_00 21:41

she's having dinner with her parents.

SPEAKER_04 21:44

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 21:44

And then Ray calls. Yes. And then there's this there's a there's a scene that just shows her mother. I don't know if you picked up on this and it slowly zooms into it. Uh huh. I did. And I remember being like, I perked up, I'm like, What is that?

SPEAKER_05 22:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:03

For anybody who's listening, we don't get any fan mail. I hate to call this out, but I would love to know what that meant. I don't y you didn't see you didn't see it in any of your research, did you?

SPEAKER_04 22:14

No, I didn't. But I think that um I almost wonder so first of all, two things. One is I think it's really interesting that he got her home phone number and called her. That's like another, how did you get my address to send me these gloves?

SPEAKER_00 22:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 22:28

Um, but that's really creepy. Um, to get her home phone number and call her. But I guess I mean, I'm not defending him or saying that it's okay, but you know, he hadn't heard from her in a long time and he tracked her down. Um, and then also that scene that you were just talking about with the close-up on the mother, I think she knew that something was up and that not only maybe was it her daughter's disorder, but I think it was also um she knew that it had something to do with a relationship issue. I mean, I it to me it didn't seem like her family knew her mom and dad knew about the knew the details of the situation, but I think when she got the phone call and then Mirabelle answered the phone and it was kind of like quiet and silent and awkward, I think that I think that her mom was like something's up and she knew exactly because I think it's like a mom's instinct, they say. Like to know that that's what it was. Like it wasn't I don't know, I'm just making it up here, but like it wasn't a call from work saying, um, are you coming in next week or something? It was like she her mom like this had a gut feeling that it was right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:44

I get it.

SPEAKER_04 23:45

So I really like yeah. That's my interpretation.

SPEAKER_00 23:50

Quality insight.

SPEAKER_04 23:51

Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 23:53

So it's interesting, she kind of she rebounds back to Ray a little bit. He convinces her to go to a event in New York.

SPEAKER_04 24:06

And because originally she had said she wasn't he'd bought he the long story of it, he's asked her if he if she wanted to go, she said yes. He bought her a ticket, and then something happened, and um, we're not gonna say what it is, and then she said I can't go, and then that's what the phone call was home, is will you still

New York Invite And Big Gestures

SPEAKER_04 24:25

go to New York? Will you still go to New York with me? And she said yes. Sorry, go ahead.

SPEAKER_00 24:32

What's interesting is they have a reunion back at his house, and he he makes a very what is his they don't really describe what is job. He they say he or he says he's a logistician. Yeah. He works in I don't he uses the discipline of logic, I would assume in computers somehow, because he flies back and forth. He has a place in Seattle, and he flies on a private jet, so you know he's crazy loaded.

SPEAKER_04 25:06

And you he's thinking of getting another apartment in the yeah. Uh he just mentioned that he's oh, uh he's thinking of getting an apartment in New York. New York.

SPEAKER_00 25:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 25:16

Because he goes there so often.

SPEAKER_00 25:17

Right. So he makes a a very large gesture to help her out, but then on the heels of that, makes an off-handed comment about moving to New York that just it doesn't send her spiraling, because she's back on medication, but it just I think it throws the door wide open as to what her relationship is with him.

SPEAKER_04 25:48

Yes. When he does, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:50

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 25:52

So there is a without giving away the ending, she bumps into Jason Schwartzmann again. And what's interesting is we haven't spent any time on this because so much of the slide deck talked about his her her psychological issues, but Schwartzmann had his own too. Well, he was he just was immature. Very immature. And I find this amazing. He's a he does stencil and graphics for a uh amplifier company. Yeah. And he

Jeremy Learns How To Relate

SPEAKER_00 26:30

is he saves the day at a show and plugs his amp or his company's amp in to a when a a band is performing and they one of their amps is a blowout and he throws their their amp on. Saves the day and then they're like, hey, come with us. He's like, yeah, come hang out with us. And just go on tour with us, and then he goes. And it's funny because in real life, if that were to happen, you go on tour with a bunch of rock musicians around the country for four months or five months or whatever it is, you're gonna get into some debauchery. Yeah, you're living on a bus. And instead, the lead singer is this emotionally in touch guy at the record store, and he's he says to Schwartzman, you gotta learn how to talk to people. So he starts getting him books on like self-help books on tape to listen to instead of like you know buying new music. He's like, You need to learn how to connect with people. Listen to this stuff a lot. This is all you should be listening to.

SPEAKER_04 27:42

And that being said, my commentary on that situation is that I really liked that moment in the movie. I mean, I do think it's kind of s strange, but at the same time, um, I know that there are people like that in the world uh who um are lacking in an area, we'll just say, and they really do need help and they need someone, a friend or a coworker or someone like that to step up and say, like, I can help you with this, or you know, I the nice way to say it, like you said, they were in that store and he gets them all these self-help uh CDs or whatever, and you need to like learn how to talk to people, especially women. And because clearly no one had helped him in that department, but he wanted to do b do that better. Um, but he just didn't know He was clumsy about it, very clumsy about it, and so I just thought like that's a cool moment in there. I mean for him to help him because his character was really awkward and really Yeah, just you can tell all the wants it makes me uncomfortable.

SPEAKER_00 28:52

Yeah, you can tell all the want and desire was there, yeah. But he didn't have the finesse, or not even just the finesse. And you feel bad. I think. Yeah, you feel bad because when the desire is there, but just not the the ability to share.

SPEAKER_05 29:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:09

Which is really what opens up the the ability to have a dialogue. And that as much as anything else needs to be learned or taught or led by example. Yeah. And he clearly didn't have that. And then he finds this with a with a on a rock bus.

SPEAKER_04 29:29

Yeah. And it's so funny. I mean, I guess that's one thing, not I mean, that's one thing I forgot to say is that it was just like, I don't know, fill in the blank with the word, but like how it happened. Like this guy oh, I know what I was gonna say.

SPEAKER_00 29:43

You wouldn't expect it to happen there.

SPEAKER_04 29:44

Not at all. This guy took it.

SPEAKER_00 29:46

Give him like a heroine. Give him a I I believe that you would get him hooked on heroin, but we drink alcohol and do drugs. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 29:54

Um when we're not performing, like what or when we are, but what come join us and um oh, and I feel like in some cases, in that situation or any similar situation, that some people would have just like passed him off and been like, okay. I mean they would say this to their face probably, but like, you're weird, like it was nice having you on the bus for two weeks. See you later. But instead, this guy like takes him under his wing, yeah. So I just I really like that.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

This is the part we always struggle, or I I struggle with is not giving away the ending. But there is, I would imagine if you're listening to this, or if you you can kind of probably piece together what the the logical conclusion is. But what is funny to me about Ray's character is he works so hard to keep this person at a distance. He's clearly he's older than I am. He's gotta be approaching his 60s at this point. I would say he hooks up with a younger woman, but he keeps her, it's very obvious as you as you look through the slide deck what he's trying to do. He's trying to keep this person at arm's length. Yeah. And you think to yourself, why? Mm-hmm. Now

Keeping Love At Arm’s Length

SPEAKER_00 31:20

I I I can almost I can understand it as a young guy. You don't want too many attachments. But on the back nine of your life, why would you do that?

SPEAKER_05 31:34

Yeah, I don't know.

SPEAKER_00 31:35

Like I get that you're you're traveling around a bit, but like what becomes clear as you get older is the need to uh have connection. And everybody's on a different path, so we can't raise like an imagined person. But like if you were Ray's friend, Ray has this realization at the end, I think your mic's gonna slide off the end there, you might want to slide it in. See what I mean? Yeah. Thank you. Or tilt the the one towards you in a little bit. So it can yeah, I just I don't want it to fall off while you're talking. You kind of feel that if Ray had a friend, yeah, that if Ray had a friend, even another guy, to see them together and be like, why are you Yeah, why why are you just have a physical relationship with this woman? Like, you're not gonna have kids.

SPEAKER_04 32:40

I think he did have another uh quote friend who did ask him about that because didn't he go out he did, I shouldn't say didn't he? He he went out to dinner with a lady who I think he had a relationship before.

SPEAKER_03 32:55

Right.

SPEAKER_04 32:56

And she I guess understood what the relationship with Ray would what a relationship with Ray would be like, and when she asked him if he was seeing anybody, and then other detailed questions about that, she he asked him if Mirabel knew what being in a relationship with him was like. And I think a lot of that was because didn't it come up that she was like a lot younger than him? And that she and I think that other lady knew that in that situation, being on her side, not like could relate to her more, she um could understand. I knew the score that like this this girl is looking for or would like to be in a relationship, not in a relationship like Ray is thinking.

SPEAKER_00 33:50

And this woman was like, hey, I'm down for just hooking up with she was. But I'm curio I'm wondering if you're doing this on purpose or if you're willfully ignoring the obvious. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:05

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 34:06

So Ray is I don't want to call him a deplorable character, but I think there is an element of kind of seeing what you want to see with him.

SPEAKER_04 34:21

Yeah, I would agree. You did mention that during you did mention that during the movie, and I think that I mean, I would agree with that. Like there's and I think for both of the main characters, it's like that, don't you? Like each person is seeing the things that they like I'm only saying. She's trying to brought it up.

SPEAKER_00 34:39

Yeah, she's trying, and your slide deck again brought this up, is that she doesn't have much of an identity.

SPEAKER_01 34:47

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 34:48

And she she kind of f in place of that, she becomes a she allows Ray to be the sugar daddy, and she fills the role of the of the the younger person servicing him.

SPEAKER_01 35:10

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 35:11

You know, without without putting a word to it, you need to be you have to have some kind of presence to be that girl. And that's she accepts that in the short term as her role as a kept woman. Even though there's a clearly a deeper desire to have an actual connection. And she's li she kind of accepts that I'm getting some kind of attention, which is better than living in the in the the void of Los Angeles doing something that is on the verge of not mattering at this shop.

SPEAKER_01 35:45

Mm-hmm.

SPEAKER_00 35:47

So it's a f and I thought it was perfect to choose Los Angeles as the place to tell this story. Whenever you have a a story that hinges on loneliness or desperation or desire that's not met, LA is the perfect place for that. Yeah because it's seething, it's everywhere in that town. Especially with it it's it just hit home for me, having lived there, knowing what it's like to dec desire an outcome, looking out your window, seeing lots of the haves, the people who have what you want, it being beautiful and sunny all the time, but realizing it's so f it can be so far away from you. I think Mirabel was just kind of created to highlight that point. I don't know either. But at the end, you didn't think it was possible to feel bad for Ray at the end, but a little bit you do, because I what's weird to me is that you can get to that age and realize that you spent so much time time trying to keep someone at bay, and then when they proceed without you, it's like it just kind of dawns on him, like, why did I do that? I don't know why I did that. Yeah. Um he and he makes an admission to her at the end, and she can tell she gets a little weepy, and it's you know, I under I don't even consider that a mean move on his part. I can understand the longing to be able to say, hey, I made this mistake and I did feel this way, and there's no excuse for it. I j I just need to say it because I I have made a mistake and I recognize it and I didn't mean to hurt you in the way I did. It wasn't my intention to you know, for all these negative things to happen to you. Right. So it's hard to recommend a movie like this, even though I re it's or making the recommendation is difficult because there's components of it that are really there's especially the stuff with Schwartzmann, there it's a lot of it is comical. But there's so many sections of this movie that are I don't want to call it a downer. There's almost a bit there's almost a bittersweet quality to it.

SPEAKER_04 38:31

Yeah. I wouldn't say it's a downer. I really I mean on a personal level, I I really like this movie um because um like I think there are many storylines told at the beginning. You see them happen throughout the movie, so there's kind of like a middle and then there's an end. And I mean when I was watch the the

Why The Movie Hits So Hard

SPEAKER_04 39:00

first time that I saw it a long time ago, I thought, like, what what is going to happen? Where is this movie going? And I definitely didn't see all the different like pieces and details, plot points that it showed. Um, and then I remember thinking, even watching it recently, how are they gonna wrap this up? What what happens at the end? And like you said earlier, it's not we're not gonna say it and give it away, but I think it's like I don't know, it's just an interesting study, and like the um notebook LM that I did really focused on the psychology of it. Is that the right one? And um, I would not have that's not where I would have centered things, I guess. I mean, it's part of it for sure, but it's I think it helps you understand.

SPEAKER_00 39:53

I think the no understand helps you understand, like for anyone who doesn't have an experience with someone who has mil mental illness or depression, yeah. Like if you look at it from that through that lens, like why doesn't she just dump this dump his ass? Well, because there is there's this other component, yeah, there's a psychological component, a disorder she is dealing with, yeah, and that her breakup or her unfulfilled relationship is compounding that. It's not as simple as, hey, this guy doesn't want what I want. It's you can't look at it through that lens.

SPEAKER_04 40:32

For her, it's more complicated.

SPEAKER_00 40:33

Yeah, and notebook helps us kind of break out look, there's a psychology thing that's happening within this person and within this person. Yeah, I was gonna say it's not just that's right. It's not just right, right. So when you uh do an analysis like that, it's helpful because it allows you to get more out of the media product.

SPEAKER_05 40:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:57

It allows you to extract a lot more out of the movie. I think someone who has not someone who would watch this might feel a little unfulfilled coming out of it, but someone who has grown up around people with emotional disorders or someone with a problem with alcohol or drugs or depression would see this and it would hit so much arder. Yes. Even though Very true. I you know what? I thought thought the same thing you did. I remember being in the theater seeing this, and when she pulled out those pills and looked at them and closed the top, I'm like, oh. And then she threw them away. I'm like, I know where this is going. She's gonna have a real hard time with this. Because it's not just it's not going the way she wants it to. It's not just the relationship isn't gonna work, she thinks it's gonna develop, and he's just in it for a good time and for someone to be around, someone to be a sugar daddy to. It's not just the relationship isn't gonna work out. She has all this other psychological crap that she has to deal with. This is gonna be an amplifier to it. Right. And when he makes that admission to her, it's she's such a great actress. It's so visceral. Like, it's almost like she like something is being like surgically removed from her without anesthetic, the clear agony that she's in. So you know, even if you weren't around those kind of psychological problems, you I don't know. People have so many different perspectives they bring to seeing a movie. I feel like. I was I was critiqued at Toastmasters for using the for using the terminology like.

SPEAKER_05 42:57

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 42:57

So all these things I all these all these parts of conversation I have to learn to edit out. But every audience member views a film through a a lens with different tones to it and different filters to it. So I I feel that the challenge for a filmmaker, you can't connect with everybody, but you have these, it's almost like if you're looking through a filter, there are these certain through lines that the filmmaker wants to get through every potential filter of every audience member and just connect and be like, oh, I remember what a breakup felt like. Even if you don't understand all the other psychological things that are going on, you can connect at least with that feeling. Right. And that's I just remember that. I'll never forget that scene with the note just oh my god, that just Gutted me. So and other people will see it and be like, I don't see what the big deal is. Like, well, you've never I don't know if you've ever been hurt like that, or you're pretending it like you don't feel it, but uh if you've been hurt like that, you don't forget it. Oh look at that.

SPEAKER_04 44:18

What is it time?

SPEAKER_00 44:19

It's time, and let's but finish up.

SPEAKER_04 44:21

I was just gonna say, excuse me, that the emotions in this movie I think were really high. You know, there are really high highs and they were really, really low lows. Um, but again, I'd like I feel like it kind of all came together.

SPEAKER_00 44:36

Worthwhile to see if I think so. If you're

Recommendation And Next Week’s Pick

SPEAKER_00 44:40

if you have a desire to understand how psychology or just mental health will impact your relationships with other people. Um I don't I don't like to rate movies, I don't think that's really fair, but we wouldn't watch it if we didn't get something out of it. So when you get a chance.

SPEAKER_04 45:05

I would recommend it.

SPEAKER_00 45:07

I wouldn't. You have to have the conversation with somebody. So like, what are you in the mood for? Do you want if you want something mindless, this isn't for you.

SPEAKER_04 45:15

No, this is not that movie. You have to watch it when you're yeah, in kind of the right mood.

SPEAKER_00 45:20

Yeah, and it you know what I would suggest is watch it with somebody you love. Watch it with someone that you're you have a stable relationship with, so you can actually but if you're if you're a single person longing for love, don't watch this yet at this stage in your life. I I wouldn't. I think it like and not to say that you couldn't handle it. I personally, if I was in that frame, I'd have a hard time with it. It would but it would bum me up. But but if you're I almost feel like it was made for people who have ascended that ladder or gotten to that point. What point? You know, whether just whether in a stable or a loving relationship, I think it makes it easier to digest.

unknown 46:09

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 46:09

That's my perspective. But you can see that we're gonna pick this up at a later bat time and bat channel because we're at over 45. Okay. And are we gonna do Power Ballad next?

SPEAKER_05 46:22

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 46:23

We are so next week, we saw it last week. You'll get the review. Uh more on this later because I'm gonna run our podcast through AI to see if we can get a better reach going forward. But thanks for listening. Hugs and kill. Oh, wait, I didn't do a recipe again. Oh, you know what you know I'll do real quick? I'll do the sandwich I made. Okay. This was amazing.

SPEAKER_04 46:52

Amazing.

SPEAKER_00 46:53

So it was a loaded

Loaded Grilled Cheese Recipe

SPEAKER_00 46:56

cheese grilled cheese sandwich. And here's what I did. So artisan bread, don't get anything from Meyer, get something from real bakery, sliced. So buttered on one side of each of the slice, and then on that, you're gonna want to use. We use two different cheeses. We use the spicy Colby and the, what was the other one? It was some kind of baked cheese. Oh, um you can use whatever you want, but get a little inventive.

SPEAKER_04 47:26

Not plain cheese.

SPEAKER_00 47:28

Not not no slices. Get go get a real get something spicy and some kind of like a baking cheese or a baked cheese. And then sliced uh hair th hair thin sliced ribeye, which I fr not fried, but uh pan seared, into just like little they're almost like strips of bacon, and then chopped uh peppers, onions, zucchini, spiralized zucchini, spiralize the zucchini and and chop the pepper and onion, uh uh saute that with a little bit of avocado oil or olive oil, salt, pepper, and garlic, and you set those two things separate, the the meat and the peppers and onions. Then you combine them on the sandwich with sliced avocado, and then of course, hay honeys, hot pepper honey, and then what was the green stuff we used? Chimichuri. Chimichuri, which if you can find a good one, on the other side of the sandwich, on this side that you don't put the hot honey on, jam it together, and then just sear it like you do a a regular grilled cheese sandwich. It's gonna be tough, I'm gonna tell you this right now, to keep it all together. You're gonna have to figure out how to be an artisan to flip this thing because it is a fat sandwich. But how'd I do?

SPEAKER_04 48:59

Very good. Oh, you mean not right now with the recipe. How did you do with the sandwich? Yep. Amazing. It was so good.

SPEAKER_00 49:09

I know you think that because she's the other half of the podcast, she has to say these things. Nope. This we've made some stinkers. And we've chosen to forget them. We've made a couple of pasta dishes that went absolute nowhere. But this was dynamite.

SPEAKER_04 49:29

It was so good. It was, it was like I've always honestly wondered, like, when people say like every bite is better than the last. I'm like, that can't really be true. How no way. This is that sandwich for me. Like, I was like, oh, I get it now. I really get it. We made it two nights in a row. Well, you made it two nights in a row.

SPEAKER_00 49:48

So hair thin sliced ribe. That's it, and just fry it up with butter and set it aside. And the chimichuri and the hot pepper honey, don't skimp on that. It's worth it.

SPEAKER_04 49:59

Oh my gosh, the flavors and the spice is so good.

SPEAKER_00 50:03

Nailed it, even included that. Alright, we gotta go.

SPEAKER_04 50:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 50:07

Hugs and kisses, too to loo.

SPEAKER_04 50:09

Thank you.