June is reserved for a Movie of the Month that comes from a female director. A Woman’s perspective is welcome any month but we don’t want it to get neglected by the capricious nature of voting so all entries for this Episode were directed by women and Karyn Kusama’s 2009 teen girl horror comedy topped the returns. It was a film expected to do better, widely criticized on it’s release, and having developed a much better reputation in the intervening years.
One of the reasons that the film was criticized at the time was for the inclusion of a girl on girl kiss. Was this about empowerment or exploitation. Star Megan Fox was also in the news at the time for having complained about Director Michael Bay and she was hounded by the media over reports about a nude swimming scene in the film. It also appears that critics had their knives out for screenwriter Diablo Cody, who had won the Oscar for Original Screenplay the year before for “Juno” and now needed to be taken down a peg or two as is typical of overnight successes. Was it also because she was a woman?
Emily Slade is the champion of this film and she leads a discussion featuring four guys who probably would not have been the target audience for the movie. We discuss the marketing strategies, the controversy and the lesbian subtext of the film with Howard Casner, Nick Rehak, Will Slater and Lambcast host Richard Kirkham. There are some differences of opinions, some movement on some of the themes and generally a thoughtful discussion of sexism, gay portrayals in movies and horror movie ratings.
We also manage to slip in a discussion of the career of Adam Brody as we take on the emo rock soundtrack of Jennifer’s Body. Because we need a good boy gone bad and a plaintive 2000s rock ballad to make the movie complete. If you listen to the show, you get to hear Richard Completely misunderstand Bobby Movies and Emily make the dramatic claim that they supersede the works of J.R.R. Tolkien
Introductions
Discussion 2:37
Lambscores 58:30
Rants/Raves/Reviews 1:00:55
1 Star Rating Game 1:08:12
Plugs 1:19:50
Outtake 1:28:12
Emily Why This Film Podcast?
Howard Pop Art
Will Exploding Helicopter
Nick Deep Blue Sea Podcast Rehak Radio
Richard KAMAD 80s Nostalgia Central
The show can be found, of course, via iTunes – just do a search for “LAMBcast.” Also, I always post a link to the show on the LAMBcast’s Facebook page, and there’s a player there if you’d like to listen online. Find the show here:
https://www.podomatic.com/podcasts/lambcast/episodes/2021-06-15T09_35_32-07_00
If you’d ever like to catch up on back episodes, go there. If you’re interested, you too can be a LAMBcaster – we love new blood! For more information on the LAMBcast, check out the topic at the LAMB Forums. Music provided royalty-free by Kevin MacLeod’s Incompetech website. Big thanks to Kevin for providing this service. Closing song by Cake. The LAMBcast loves feedback, too – if you’d like yours read on a future show, leave it in the comments section at the LAMB. Please visit and like our Facebook page, and finally, we’re on iTunes, and would still love a review, even if it’s a bad one. Thanks for listening!