DZ-124: Making the Despicable Compelling — Transcript

First they cast Denzel Washington, like, and they dress him in like a tank top and suspenders, like, okay, sure, great, I'm in, I'm sold, whatever he wants. Hi, I'm Mel Killingsworth.

And I'm Chaz Fisher.

And welcome to Draft Zero, a podcast where two emerging filmmakers, one Australian, one American slash Australian, try to figure out what makes great screenplays work.

And this is our unexpected but delightful part two of Noivember in December, which will most definitely, because it's now become a two part, come out probably January or February. But doesn't matter. For those of you who didn't listen to the last episode, go back, listen to our episode looking at what is noir uh why it's relevant to every fucking genre of story not just noir this isn't an episode on like how to write a film noir this is how what can we what craft tools can we learn from noir in particular how to make characters doing despicable things uh compelling and how to separate what a film is saying as a piece of art as against what characters are doing like just representing it is not endorsement so we did uh we started with the classic of double indemnity and now in this episode we are flowing through time to show how noir is relevant in different time periods from the 90s we're doing devil in a blue dress written.

And directed by carl franklin from a novel by walter mosley.

And we're ending with a 2024 film chas comes through with a meld suggestion but a modern movie uh woman of the hour uh.

Written by ian mcdonald and directed by Anna Kendrick, who is also a co-lead. So, all right, let's go into Devil in the Blue Dress.

Hi, Ezekiel Rollins. For Ezekiel Rollins, L.A. was a world of sunshine and shadows. Howdy, mate. Hey, Ezekiel. How you doing, baby? Take easy on upstairs. Black and white. We got no work here. I'm sorry, fella. My name's not Fella. My name is Ezekiel Rollins. So here you need a job. What kind of work do you do? I'm just looking for somebody. Dafty Monet. Fiancee of Todd Carter. She's been gone two weeks. See, Daphne has a predilection for the company of Negroes. He thought he knew how to play the game. Any of y'all seen a white girl by the name of Dahlia? Delia? Something like that? Her name is Daphne. You can't get none of that tonight. You know it? Until he stepped into a world.

Do you want to summarize what happens in Devil in the Blue Dress?

Oh, boy. So this is an immediate post-World War II film, and we've got this veteran named Easy. And he has essentially become this kind of like, within the neighborhood, he's known as a guy who can do you a job, right? And so he's at his local watering hole, and this private eye comes to him and is like, I'm looking for this woman. Help me find this woman. So Isis is like, all right, sure. So he goes down this rabbit hole of attempting to find this woman. And he uncovers a bunch of corruption, but he also uncovers connections to his neighborhood that he was wildly unaware of. So there's a lot of political implications, but there's also a lot of personal implications.

Yeah. I mean, he's hired to find a woman, Daphne, who wears a very blue dress.

It's not subtle.

Daphne is being pursued by- Multiple people.

Really.

The private detective who hires Easy. by her fiance, who's also running for mayor, the other person who's running for mayor. And then I wouldn't say being pursued by, but has a connection with a local gangster called Frank Green, who, while they're trying to find her, they nudge Frank Green and Frank retaliates.

And she also has a very close connection, which at first you're kind of unsure of the origins of, with a woman that EZ's like sleeping with at the beginning.

Yes um so it's.

Really it's hard to sum up.

Sure because there's a lot of red herrings and yeah.

There's a lot of moving parts and also you don't want to give the end away.

Yeah well no in this in drafts era we give the end away um importantly is referenced early on but don cheedle's character Mouse, the former friend from the South, Texas, I think they're from.

I'm actually not positive where Mouse is from. I know they met in the military, where they both served.

And, like, Easy gets asked by his friend, like, you and Mouse killed that guy, didn't you? Like, right early on.

You know, last time I heard these fellas playing the night, he was back in Houston. That night your old buddy Mouse had to pull me up off of your ass. That's the way you remember it. Hell, that's the way it was. Look at him. When you gonna admit that you helped Miles kill old man Navarro Shea? You know, man, come on, get off that. You know, I didn't have nothing to do with that.

And Easy's constantly denying, and he's played by Denzel Washington, right? Like, you're on board whatever Easy says in Easy's point of view. But then it becomes very clear, given how casually Mouse kills people. And that Mouse says to Easy on a number, I think, two occasions. Like, when Mouse rescues Easy from Frank Green, the gangster, Mouse shoots Frank Green. He's like, if you didn't want me to shoot him, why did you call me here? and then later a friend of easy's a bartender the person who puts him up for the job in the very beginning he leaves this friend this bartender with mouse while he's going to go and rescue daphne and mouse kills him he's like oh tying him up would take too long i just killed him and yeah.

This is clearly what you wanted you just couldn't bring yourself to say it right.

Yeah if you didn't want him dead you wouldn't have left him with me.

What happened i had no time to be tying him up easy Look, you just said don't shoot him, right? That's right. Well, I didn't. I just, I choked him. Well, how am I going to help you out if I'm back here fooling around with him now? Easy. Look, if you ain't one to kill, why'd you leave him with me?

Yeah. And this is where I think it becomes, so all of these, we've talked a little bit about which of these films are adaptations, which of them are based on a true story. There's some crossover there, et cetera, et cetera. Long Goodbye was relocated to the 70s, whereas the original source material is not. But this is where I think it's super, super, super crucial that this film was made in 95.

But it's.

Set in 48 because.

This is.

Immediately post-world war ii and race is crucial and context of immediately post-war service is crucial and.

Like all.

This is really intertwined and you move it to the 90s and everything changes.

And all of the i mean look it's set in 48 they speak in 40s language and lingo they wear fedoras there's venetian blinds right the the every every room is filled with smoke and so.

Many old like vintage cars oh.

Yeah beautiful cars so the the style of noir is laid across the visual style the visual language of noir is very much a part of this film but so is the world view and the bleakness and the narrative tropes as well but they do something they'd use it to talk about something very different in in this film, There is the power that comes with money, but also the powerlessness that comes from being African-American in 1948.

Well, class, race, gender, and sexuality are always elements of noir. All noir deals with that to some extent or another. Like, this is more explicit on some than others. But, like, even noir that is, quote, like, full of white people, the characters who are racist and the characters who are not racist, It's actually a very clear delineation, and it's always a subtle through line. It's how you signal who the worst guys are. It's how you signal who is, again, with the Hays Code, it becomes really... I'm agreeing with your point overall, but I do think that even if you watch noir, that its primary concern is not racial politics. It is embedded in the very fabric of it.

And maybe this is me being white Anglo-Saxon English, where race was not as much a discussion with me growing up. Like, I grew up in Egypt and India, so it's not like I was unaware of race. But I feel like the discussion, like the discourse, the social discourse and awareness around race is much more overt in the U.S. than it is like certainly in Australia. In Australia, it's like, no one's racist. We don't talk about race. What do you mean? Yeah.

Well, and when noir came of age, race was also like, if you look at a lot of old noir, it's not just quote unquote African Americans and white Americans. There's a huge element of Hispanic and specifically Mexican elements. There's also like Italian and Irish elements. Like there's all these very, obviously, noir is not an American concept. However, the four films we're looking at are American.

Sure. I mean, the genre evolved.

Oh, France might have a couple of words. I agree with you. I agree. I think that the genre came of age very heavily within the US.

Oh, look, if we, you know, if we had done a non-English language film, we could have done The Samurai, which is, you know, non-more noir.

Yeah, I think specifically Japanese noir to me is just one of the most fascinating genres of the whole thing. Anyway, we're getting sidetracked. I'm not, I'm bringing myself back.

So, this film is the first one that actually has voiceover. We have direct access into Easy.

Like non-diegetic voiceover. Yeah.

And it's not at someone.

Yep.

It's like he's talking to himself.

Yeah.

Right? The audience has access to it, but it's not second person.

Right, right, right.

It never says, you know, blah, blah, blah. And like one of the most important bits of voiceover where like voiceover, we've got whole episodes on voiceover. Go and look at that. But it gives you that access to a character's motivation such that you will jump over hurdles, what might otherwise be narrative hurdles. And there's one where Easy is, he's found Daphne. Daphne's asked him to drive to a house in the Hollywood Hills. And he's a black man driving a very fancy car with a white appearing woman. And I say because that becomes a major plot point.

Right.

In a white neighborhood.

Now we know who Jennifer Beals is.

Yes.

At the time she was not hugely famous yes so uh the fact that she's played by jennifer beals to tell you like oh white appearing woman white passing um but like now we understand who she is but uh yeah she's he's driving this woman and going wait what the fuck yeah you want me to record scratch what now well.

He says in voiceover i know i'm doing a stupid thing right now.

Yeah and.

That's for me is a such a way an example of how voiceover can make characters doing things that we don't decisions that we don't buy it helps us buy them because they're like yeah i know i'm stupid i'm doing it.

Anyway yeah and all these all every single one of these films has someone doing something that we know is incredibly stupid but for understandable reasons and they all contextualize it different ways and yeah two of them do it through via voice for like yeah i get Also, like, look at her, come on, man. Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

Now, to reveal, Because for us to get to the end of the movie and discuss point of view and characters changing, we have to explain the ending. So, it turns out that Daphne, her mother was Creole and her father was white.

Right. So, she's Frank's half sibling.

Yes.

And she's white passing and Frank is black. Like, does not pass in any way, shape or form.

So, the whole reason EZ is hired is because the private detective played by Tom Sizemore is white. And he says, this woman has a predilection for going to places, to African-American places, places I cannot go, but places you could go EZ, right? So, that's why EZ gets the job in the first place, is he is a man, an African-American man, who the bartender Joppy thinks will do this job for him. We'll find a white woman and dob her into this suspicious looking private investigator.

Yeah. And I think like, and this is the conversation has come back around again a lot recently with sinners, right? But I think, and partly maybe because this is an American film and whatever, but like the fact that she goes to these places, these predominantly black bars and speakeasies doesn't at first bump on easy as, oh, well, she's not white because there were a lot of reasons for that. There were a lot of reasons that people wanted to engage, that white people did engage in that culture at the time. Yeah, exactly. Like music that literally was not allowed in white only spaces, like, you know, or they were, you know, attempting, like there's always been this sort of subculture, right? Where there are certain people who are accepted into spaces, even though they are not quote unquote of that space. And so easy doesn't really blink in terms of like, oh sure, this white woman's going to all of these places. and if you went they don't know you you would pop out she would notice you etc.

There's also very early on a there's you know the the private detective has as much said that she is uh attracted and sleeping with black men right and that she is incredibly good looking and easy is going and asking around asking all the guys saying oh there's this white woman around apparently she's really hot knowing that they would have let in a really hot white woman who's going to sleep with them as well.

Yeah, of course.

Like that permission structure is kind of built into it.

Inherent motivation.

Yeah.

Ain't never laid eyes on them. That's a shame. See, Daphne has a predilection for the company of Negroes. She likes jazz and pig's feet and dark meat. Know what I mean? Pre-election.

But turns out that her husband, her fiance, who was running for mayor, as soon as he discovered her African-American heritage, said, I cannot marry you. And it's discovered by his political enemy, the other guy running for mayor. And so he pays her off to go away.

The fiance pays her off because, I mean, again, we're spoiling the end. basically to sum up it being discovered that you are a pedophile at the time in the 40s is less damning than.

Being discovered.

That you are engaging in miscigenation sleeping with a non-white person.

And you are you reference pedophilia because the political opponent what daphne the devil in the blue dress has found she has found photos of the political opponent molesting children and she intends to use those photos to give them to her husband her fiance sorry so that he'll go oh i can still run i can blackmail my political opponent so that i can still run because she thought that he wouldn't be with her because he couldn't run for mayor and that as soon as he could run for mayor again they would be together and his.

Determination is i won't be with you if i can't run for mayor and it's not my fault that society says i can't run for mayor if i'm with you a black woman but also that's just how it is sorry.

Baby and there's two major threats so first of all when all of this comes out easy has rescued her he's killed the private detective who was working for the pedophile um see it's sounding convoluted but really it's easily followed when you're watching it like most.

Noir but then you try to explain it you're like actually there's a lot of moving parts.

But her as much as her fiance does love her he still won't marry her he cannot marry someone of another race which.

At the time i mean depending on the state and if you're running for mayor your uh ambitions are higher than state was blanketly illegal.

Yeah, So, she's disappointed by that. Now, one of the things, and this is why I've watched all these movies with my wife, and I think this is why she didn't like the film, is that Easy has the photos. And what Easy does with those photos is he gives them to Daphne's former fiancé, the less evil white mayor. He doesn't do anything evil, but, you know, he's not like...

Less bad.

Yeah, less bad white mayor.

He makes a morally grey choice, but not a legally or like truly perverted choice.

He gives him the photos not to reveal that this guy is a pedophile, but just to stop that guy from becoming mayor. Right. And I think Anna had frustration that this film, that both Easy and the film were like, well, that guy's just going to go on abusing children. He won't get to be mayor, but he's going to go on abusing children. and i think it's a very noir.

Ending that.

Easy is like publishing those photos would not have done anything.

Right nor is very nihilist and pragmatic yeah this would not do anything but get me put in someone else's crosshairs it wouldn't change anything it wouldn't change his actions it wouldn't get him arrested like again we've seen throughout the film his other connections his money his political power his general power like i i believe at the time that we meet him that the boy in his car is his stepson um or like uh if not officially then vaguely his stepson.

Oh it's it's an adopted son.

Adopted okay we're talking about.

The pedophile here not.

Easy yeah yeah the pedophile yeah when when easy meets the politician the boy in his car is legally within his care. And it's like, well, that's not going to change because a black man says something. This is 1948. If a black man says something, I'm going to get beat up and nothing will change.

And everyone who has become aware of those photos has been killed up until now. There's a guy called Richard McGee. And importantly, Coretta, who is a friend of Easy's.

The woman Easy sleeps with.

She seduces him, right? Importantly, because his friend is drunk in the next room.

Sure. Or, I mean, I think Easy knows what's happening when he helps his drunk friend home. He's like, yeah, well, sure. And then I'm going to, like, load you into the bedroom and go out and fuck your girlfriend. But yes.

Putting that to one side, Coretta gets murdered. And this film deliberately does not tell you who murders her. There's two, potentially three different suspects. Frank Green, her brother, is one of the suspects that Daphne sent Frank to kill her own friend. because it comes out that Coretta, she had possession of the photos, she was going to sell them back to the pedophile as opposed to, you know, protecting her friend or trying to help her friend. So it could have been Frank Green. It could have been a psycho private investigator on behalf of pedophile, or it could have been Joppy the bartender.

I mean, as you're saying this, I'm like, oh, wait, I, again, and I've seen this several times in my head, I'm like, well, I know who did it. But I'm like, okay, but wait, does the film confirm that textually? I think you're right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It never does. And not only that, the film is fairly adamant it was Joppy. But when he has the conversation with Joppy, Joppy says, who told you that? Daphne?

Yeah.

There's those lingering things that even though like Daphne in the end she doesn't get to be with her the love of her life she and her her half-brother disappear off to build a new life somewhere else but her half-brother is a psychotic knife-wielding gangster and Easy has brought his friend Mouse in who as we've mentioned before Easy is directly responsible for several murders and we don't know the pedophile never his up and never comes yep easy is asking at the end of the film am i responsible for my friend's murders is what mal is mouse putting that on me actually the thing so easy ask the question of himself am.

I enabling him.

Yeah you.

Know what it's interesting until i i guess because i've seen this film a few times but i hadn't watched it with the specificity of analyzing until now and i'm like i forgot how late in the film mouse shows up.

Oh yeah like Like.

We hear about him a lot. And, like, I'm like, wow, we're, like, two-thirds of the way through, and suddenly he's here. And part of that is just, I mean, he's Don fucking Cheadle. But, you know, we hear about him a lot, and he looms large over the narrative before he actually has an impact, like, a direct impact.

Yeah, yeah. Okay, so, we've already done some exploration of how Easy does transgress in the beginning.

Oh, yeah.

This film does what I applauded Double Indemnity for not doing. It says, Easy's just been fired from his job for just standing up for his rights and pointing out that there was racial discrimination, right? Like, it says he's a veteran. It has voiceover, right? So, yeah, this film is making us go, oh, Easy is a victim of systems of oppression here that is forcing him to take this job. And he's reluctant about taking the job.

He's like- He refuses the call.

He refuses the call.

I was feeling pretty desperate that evening. In a week, I'd be two months behind on my mortgage. And no, sir, I wasn't about to lose my house, but a chill.

And even when he knows where a woman is and tells the private detective the private detective who's just pulled a gun and almost blown the head off a young man um just random dude says you're not gonna hurt her right easy knows that he's gonna hurt her so there is transgressions how do they make easy compelling well first.

They cast denzel washington.

Like and they dress him in like.

A tank top and suspenders like okay sure great i'm in i'm sold whatever he wants.

They've got voice over so we're with him when he makes every single decision yep.

We're in his internal monologue and like like he said even when he's like this is stupid i know it's stupid i get it yep.

And they kill coretta so he then kind of gets on the i'm personally invested he is following the leads in and around Daphne but he's actually also trying to find out who killed Coretta and.

It's complicated right who killed the woman he's sleeping with but also his friend like we go and see his friend.

His friend is.

Devastated his friend whom he legitimately loves like whatever he did with his girlfriend aside is like broken.

Yeah broken.

Up by I couldn't stop this who could have done this Who would have wanted this? And so there's definitely that element of, I mean, a lot of noir person or clothes involve loyalty to your friends. He's loyal to his friend. His friend is absolutely heartbroken. And he's like, well, despite what I might have done to you, we're friends. That's, that's a side. I want to do this for you.

Yeah. So I think this one, you know, it is the, the, the whodunit kind of the mystery keeps us going along, but it does go to lengths to show easy as lying to himself as committing transgressions as being trapped by the systems but also his own choices right like yeah he's literally trapped by a mortgage like he's the only person in his community who owns his own house and he's like but i gotta pay the mortgage back.

To noir being absolutely hilarious there's a whole runner about this guy in the neighborhood who's like digging.

Up trees and like essentially And it's so funny.

Like it's genuinely hilarious and everything with mouse, like when mouse is drunk and waving a gun around, it's so funny.

So, does Easy change in this movie?

I think Easy is probably the only character who does not change.

Interesting. Because I was going to say, like, it feels like there is a lot of, like, he goes from being unemployed and desperate for money.

Okay, his circumstances change.

Yeah, yeah. And this is not, I'm agreeing with your interpretation here, just to be clear.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But I'm drawing a distinction for our audience.

Yeah, sure, okay.

He has, a lot of shit happens to him.

Yes.

You know, he's beaten, almost dies a number of times, influences mayoral politics, comes away with a ton of money.

Changes the course of the whole city slash country.

Yeah. And then ends up as a private detective working for himself. He can fund himself. Right. But he asked that question at the end of his friend. Can't remember the friend's name, but his irrelevant minor character, you know, 45 on the call sheet.

The guy playing dominoes at the front.

Yeah. So asks him.

If you got a friend that, you know, does bad things, I mean, real bad things and you still keep him as a friend, even though you know what he's like. I think that's wrong.

Am I a bad person?

Yep.

And it doesn't answer the question.

It doesn't answer it.

But also doesn't feel like he would have done anything differently.

No. Like, I love that last, and it is, so it is a voiceover. Like, they show him, and then he's like, yeah, and then we sat there and play. And it's a shot that's getting wider and wider and wider and pulling out on the street as you see all these people going about their daily life. And it's, you don't see him at all identifiable in the shot by the end. You don't, you can barely figure out which house is his. It's this, I am ineffectual in this system. And my choices, essentially, when I figure out what I did or did not do, they only impact me and I have not had a impact on the greater scheme of things. And I just think it's fantastic. and.

Unlike philip marlowe easy is in it for himself he isn't to pay the mortgage.

Yeah he's he's surviving he's.

Not in it to enforce any kind of code.

Yeah he i think he has realized that okay well the system is it doesn't just not serve me it is out to get me and therefore all i could do is survive and and that's what his decisions are based on his decisions to continue to cover up for mouse his decisions to like you said not do anything with those photos he knows it would not do any good yeah the most he can do is like let daphne go you know silently into that good night like that's the best he can do he.

Does rescue her.

Yeah yeah no he does yeah right.

He doesn't have to.

Again that's a personal stakes thing.

Yeah he he had the photos at that point.

But that's a code that he had at the beginning he hasn't changed sure that's a code that he had at the beginning that he's simply holding to.

Okay. No, I'm not saying right or wrong. I'm just going like, I'm not sure Easy at the beginning of the film would have risked his life to save a white woman.

I think he would have risked his life to save a woman.

Yeah. Okay.

Yeah. Yeah.

Okay.

I think a woman who, so far as he knows, has not done anything overtly wrong or horrifying that he would have done that. Yeah, absolutely.

So what is the worldview of the film versus the characters i feel like the film has a pretty aligned worldview with easy yeah.

The system's fucked like that's the worldview and they're both right.

Like.

The text bears out that they are both right.

Yeah and it allows us i think i think that both the theme of the film and the worldview of easy aligning is part of what is different in this film to i think the other films where i think the world views of marlo and walter are different to what the world views of the film yep but in this one the alignment still serves the same purpose of allowing us to travel along with easy as he's making very dubious yeah decisions he does he does throughout the film like not just he takes the job knowing that he shouldn't knowing that it's illegal right he he gives over the safety of a woman to a psycho he then makes dodgy decisions once he's introduced to this woman uh such as driving in a white neighborhood you know getting exposed to murders he is arrested by the cops and says give me a night to sort this out he's willing to pin these murders on other people he doesn't.

Which is similar to marlo as well like they're They're both sort of arrested. The cops are playing good cop, bad cop, hitting all up beside the head and however, He has a lot more to lose.

Oh, yeah.

Than Marlo. And they both know it.

And he brings in Mouse. Like, he's played by Denzel Washington. And you're like, I will go along with whatever you say. But when you just list out his decisions, he's actually a pretty terrible person. But this film makes him compelling through voiceover, through the systems that he's facing, through his desire to get justice for Coretta, which he never does at the end. He sits easy at the end of the film, having never truly got to the bottom of who killed Coretta.

I think in Double Indemnity, if you compare this to Double Indemnity, both of their decisions are understandable from a human viewpoint. But you watch Double Indemnity and go, God, you could have easily made the other decision, easily just walked away. And you watch this decision, you go, you are cornered by the system. You are trapped. I don't see a better way out for you. So they do similar things with the character But wildly different things with the system That they're operating within Okay, Speaking of systems and characters Inable to operate within them safely Woman.

Of the hour.

Woman of the hour.

It's the dating day Hey can you do me a favor? Yeah When you get on that stage I just need you to laugh and smile Just over and over Yeah sure Hey camera get ready for the snapshot Hi Cheryl, bachelor number two Hello, Cheryl. And would you please say hello to Cheryl, bachelor number three. We're going to have a great time together, Cheryl. I don't date much. I don't date at all, actually. But you decided to go to the dating game? My agent said it would get me seen. Did you feel seen? You know, most people don't like to be seen because you have to be comfortable with yourself. I never hide who I am.

Oh, man. Directed by Anna Kendrick, written by Ian MacDonald. Highlighting why, you know, we've mentioned Billy Wilder. We've mentioned Altman. Not banging on about directors so much, even though noir is so much a directorial genre and medium. But it is important because Anna Kendrick is also the primary point of view character. Do you want to summarize this or shall I?

Go for it.

Okay. Okay, so it's the story of how Rodney Alcala basically got away with murdering what they think is over a hundred people. They mainly show him murdering women, but there's one point definitely in the film where he is considering murdering a pretty young man.

If I'm not mistaken, he was convicted for murdering almost exclusively women, but they suspect that several of his victims were men.

Well, from the end credit, I think they only convicted him of like murdering seven people and they think he murdered over a hundred.

Yeah. They charged him with like 11, convicted him of seven and then like estimates are like up to 130.

And this movie, its lens, if I may say so, arises from the kind of almost amazing quirk of this story is that Rodney Alcala... appeared as a contestant on the dating game game show and was super fucking charming and was selected by the woman on the dating show to be her date, right?

Well, this lens is that because the society's lens was that he was known as like the dating game killer or the dating game murder or something like that. Yeah, because of that quirk.

A lot of the film happens basically, it's intercutting Cheryl, the Anna Kendrick character, the contestant in The Dating Game. It's intercutting her experience on The Dating Game, realizing on a date with Rodney after the show that this man is bad news and managing to escape him. Nothing happens to Cheryl.

Which is all a true story.

But the film opens with him murdering a woman brutally and repeats cutting back to him, murdering different women brutally.

And attempting to murder also men.

Yes.

Well, what's interesting partly about that, right, is a lot of classical noir is not direct about its depiction of brutality. And a lot of neo-noir is. And I think this film walks a really fascinating line where you know exactly how brutal and horrible it is.

It's not gory.

Yeah.

It's horrifically bleak.

Yeah.

The opening murder, he strangles her and you're not on her when she's strangled to death.

Yes.

But you are on her when he revives her and then drags her off screen, which was just, And what is alarming about this film, and it does so well, is it shows Rodney being attractive, charismatic, fun, easygoing. Someone who picks up a lot of women and convinces them to drive with him the next day out into the middle of nowhere so he can take photos of them. Like he is a, he is someone who you do not expect in a, I guess, a stereotypical or judgmental way to be someone who needs to brutalize people. He does not seem to be that way. He makes women feel safe.

Exactly. He knows how to act in public. And he even knows how to act one-on-one with people to make them feel safe and to go along. Like he understands how to manipulate societal mores. He understands how to manipulate individuals. And even there are multiple times that people are shown to be slightly uncomfortable and they're still afraid to say no to him because he knows how to manipulate that politeness that we're all and specifically non male presenting people are conditioned to respond with.

And I think the, you know, there's bits on the contest, on the game show where he even says to one of the other bachelors when they're having like an above table or off camera conversation during an ad break, where he's like, I always give the girl, I know how to play this game. Like I know how to say the things I will win. Yeah. He's just so confident in himself. And he does.

Too small. Seriously. Anything under a C cup? Can't do it. What about her? What about her? You haven't seen her yet. What if she's petite? I'll let her blow me. No, you won't. I won't? Why is that? Because I always get the girl.

So tell me why this is noir, Mel.

Well, it's noir for the same reason that Zodiac and Memories of Murder are noir.

Zodiac is like has the stylistic things of noir.

Oh, so Woman of the Hour is sunshine noir, which I find like noir is not always dark.

Yeah.

It's high contrast. like a lot of people think that it needs to be like always happen at night or always happen in like dark blues and shadows but a lot of noir like sunshine noir is very bright and will lit but it's high contrast and i do think the cinematography in woman of the hour does do those noir tropes um there's like there's a little bit of lens flow there's a little bit of whatever but a lot of it is high contrast a lot of it is very like hyper stylized in a lot of ways and the game show element is quite interesting, but that creeping sensation, those long drifting takes, the ways they use landscape and the ways they use, shafts of light and those sorts of things to highlight things is very noir um so again with the style with the tropes um with the system with the fact that every system not just the cops although also the cops but even there's a woman who attempts to go to the game show producers right and is left off there's the fact that like um a lot of the victims are people who have no other social safety net you know people whose family and or like support systems are shredded as.

The film is presenting them to us.

Right as the film is presenting but also again that's a very noir trope i i'm sure like a lot of these are amalgamations right because again like 130, potential people like a lot of these are amalgamations so when i'm talking about they're shredded i'm saying like that is a very noir trope right the noir trope of somebody who doesn't have the money or the class ability or you know the racial or sexual or gender or whatever presentation to be in a safe position in society um and so a lot of that is is presented and i think There are certain scenes here that are just noir to the core, and I find fascinating because if we look at the other films, they're a more heightened type of acting, which I think we do tend to associate with noir, right? Because they're all done in, like, 40s, 70s, and then, yeah, 90s, but set in the 40s, so very heightened. And this is a slightly more realistic acting style, and I think it would be a mistake to say because the acting is more realistic. Thing itself is not noir like the nighttime scene where she's given him a fake number and he tries to say oh what about it's a very modern more realistic acting style and i think anna kundrick is doing something very interesting with saying this is a time period but this is still happening so even though the wardrobe and the sets and the setting is time period of the 70s we are drawing a direct parallel to modern times and so we're going to use modern conventions but i think it's a real mistake to say because they're modern acting conventions that therefore it's not noir oh.

I'm i asked the question to explore.

Because there's.

No detective there is a femme fatale which is anna kendrick's character.

Well there's a home fatale the the home fatale is rodney oh.

Okay yeah okay yeah all right fair.

Um yeah and i think there's no detective right but i like in a lot of noir there's not a detective but there's a person who has and in this film there's actually two and they're both women um and the first is cheryl which is anna kendrick's character and then there's also um the.

Woman who survives.

Oh okay so there's three i was actually thinking so laura who is also based on a real character who's at the dating game show who's the one who yes.

The audience member.

And she goes to the producers game show she goes to the producer then she goes to the cops there's this wonderful scene she's she's only in the film for maybe like five minutes but she screams at the cops at some point do your fucking job i.

Yeah i did i did file a report in december of last year and i don't know what else this man he was on national on television. Look, I don't know who you spoke with, all right? I don't know who I spoke with either. How many times? You forgot. do your fucking job.

Because they are i mean the system is not doing its job and she's literally, raging at the machine of here's everything you need here's the and again this happened in real life like they let him go multiple times but she is beating her head against the system and the system will not do what it is supposedly but not actually designed to do.

You're missing she's got another great scene where she's having a breakdown having seen him in the audience.

You're talking about in the car with her boyfriend laura.

Yeah she leaves with her boyfriend she tells her boyfriend and her boyfriend essentially tells her.

Yep there's.

Not much we can do you're probably overreacting.

I mean if this guy did what you're implying then wouldn't he be in jail and not on a tv show i don't know i um i mean it's a big tv show you don't think they've had their contestants, I... Maybe it is the guy, right? Maybe the police, they looked into him and they cleared him. Look, I love you. And I'm really sorry that you lost your friend. It must feel like he's around every corner. I can't even imagine, but... I'm just not sure what you want me to do. Get out.

Get out yeah they probably investigated him and it's he trusts the system and she breaks up with him over it which is great.

But it is he is a representation of the system yes so this this whole film this is what makes it noir to me he's.

A representation of the citizenry who trusts the system blindly.

I think i think the system here in this film is how men view women okay sure right And he is a representation of that in this. And this is, to me, what makes it noir. I think there are some stylistic elements that make the film noir. But to me, this worldview is you've got several characters trapped by their circumstances, making choices. Like Anna Kendrick makes the choice to go on the dating game. She is forced to by her lack of acting opportunities. But she makes the choice, right?

And she then- She chooses him.

She chooses him. I think part of her transgression, I was trying to think about this, is she actually thinks that being smart is the same as being good, right? She ridicules bachelor number one for being stupid.

Bachelor number one. Einstein said that sitting on a hot stove for a minute feels like an hour, but sitting next to a nice girl for an hour feels like a minute. That was his theory of special relativity. What's yours? What? I'll come back to you on that. Wait, hold on. Was that the actual question? When you invite a girl out for dinner, what do you expect in return? I guess that depends on the meal. Are we talking filet mignon or what? That's a good question, are we? Yeah, sure. I'm a generous guy. Good to know. Are these a scripted question? Since I'm spending an arm and a leg on dinner, I'd like to think that she could at least provide the dessert. Oh, and what would you order for dessert? Oh, you know. No, I don't. Tell me. Something hot. Like cherry's flambe? Yeah, yeah, with lots of whipped cream. Sorry, I'm on a diet. Bachelor number one, how's that theory of special relativity coming along? Hmm? Groovy, keep at it. Bachelor number three, what's the difference between a boy and a man?

She dismisses bachelor number two for being a douchebag.

But.

He's actually the one who whispers on in her ear as he's leaving don't trust that guy.

I love that moment because it's it's motivated by him wanting to get one over it's motivated by his spite and him being mad he wasn't chosen and him being shown up on national tv however he's right yes doesn't matter what his motives are he's actually seen something that she hasn't because it's something that rodney only reveals to him because he thinks well you can say this to the system and they won't believe you.

And so, the game show itself, the cops, the boyfriend, Laura's boyfriend, they're all representations. They're all different flavors and dramatizations.

The makeup women. It's women as well. It's not just men.

Yeah, yeah. Of a system that allowed Rodney Alcala to kill people with impunity for so many years and so many people. And here's the thing. they they they only show throughout the film rodney being either super charming or he shifts the actor who plays him does remarkably well phenomenal daniel zavato to the point when he shows up at the second murder i thought it was a different actor i didn't think it was said because what he's he just changed his face he's in public the second time the first time.

We see him he's He's alone.

In the middle of nowhere. I'm like, this isn't the same guy. His face shape is different. Like just amazing.

Phenomenal.

But they show him either in psychotic murderer mode or charming mode. And it is only at the very end that they show him crying after having raped and beaten one woman and he's yet to kill her. But we're fairly confident given everything that we've seen before that he is going to kill her. Yep. But he's crying. That moment clearly shows us that he feels trapped, like compelled to murder these people. We never understand. The film never discusses what's his trauma. Why is he doing this? They don't need. But that moment in the end.

It doesn't feel sorry for him, but it does. It's depiction without endorsement.

Yeah.

Hey, he exhibited these signs. We don't endorse what he did. We don't say that he had to because he felt trapped, but clearly he did feel trapped.

Yeah. And in the end, what the victim who escapes does so, it is an incredible scene that we'll probably accept here, but she's clearly a prior victim of abuse, probably sexual abuse, and she knows how to get her abusers to stop abusing her.

Hey, are you okay? I guess things got pretty crazy last night. Do you think that you could do me a favor? Do you think that you could not tell anyone about this? Please? I would just be so fucking embarrassed. You know how judgmental people can be.

And again, this is very, he was very close to what happened in real life, where basically she says, she tries to convince him, hey, promise you won't tell anyone. I'm ashamed. I'm sad about this. And again, the system is built. We saw this recently with the woman in France whose husband abused her for years and years. And she's come out and said, the thing is, victims are made to feel shame. I should not feel shame he should feel shame and in the scene as well as real life the victim who escaped manipulated him by saying I'm ashamed of this society will blame me please don't tell anyone and he knows she's right he knows that she would feel shame because that's what the system is, puts on her yeah.

And she's also treating him with gentleness.

Yeah and kindness understanding compassion even yeah like yeah like.

Again i'm trying really hard not to empathize with rodney and the film does it so well like you said it's not asking us to feel sorry for him but it does allow us to empathize it's not asking us to sympathize with him.

Right but.

It does allow us to empathize.

Which i mean to draw the the furthest parallel almost it's fascinating we've come around here right with double indemnity it never says you should do what walter did hey this is what walter did totally cool man you see a hottie you can totally murder her husband it's all good never ever ever ever however for a moment it puts you in their shoes and says can you understand why they would do that and if you can can you understand how you would avoid doing the same thing and i think that that is a big that's a big thing in i mean art in general but noir does that a lot noir depicts the absolute worst of humanity and says hey can you understand this most people can understand not every awful thing but a range of awful things great don't do that, you know yeah.

And this film i asked us to consider the killer inside me which is a film that i've had complex feelings about i've only watched it once at a at a film festival and i remember thinking this is a truly incredible movie and then almost every woman i've spoken to since has gone that is a misogynistic piece of shit and i'm like did i watch a different movie because i didn't think the movie was endorsing his and.

We don't need to.

Get into this debate.

We don't need to get into it i will say if you took the first 20 minutes out of the movie then maybe but i was so, immediately poisoned by the first 20 minutes of the movie that i was like nope and that tilted everything since but noir right but noir you.

Got a detective there's voiceover.

There's oh it's noir okay because that was the one that i hadn't seen and i watched his prep for this and went yep it's noir i think the way that it plays with noir in the first 20 minutes so fundamentally misunderstand understand so much of noir that i was just like but yes it's noir well.

That is something if anyone wants to get uh mel going.

Ask her about the killer inside me buy me a beer and ask me about this movie but.

You then suggested another movie from only two years ago that is from the perspective of a man who murders women.

Yep right.

Much like the killer inside me right like this film is from this perspective is not quite right because all of the murders are from the women's.

A lot of the murders are i would argue from a very clearly third party perspective which is fascinating yeah.

Almost voyeuristic in one of them very deliberately where we're through windows.

Yep but it opens with him yes before we even get to cheryl yeah we're within his experience i mean we only see cheryl in a very brief period of time we see him across eight years yeah um there's a lot of different things that help put us within his point of view even though the movie is not told from his point of view.

Yes. So... Hopefully, this film is remarkable to anyone going, wow, if I can spend both the opening and closing of a film and throughout the film with a brutal, misogynistic woman killer.

Yep.

And it ends with us, again, not sympathizing, but asking us to empathize with him. And still, the film is not endorsing it. At no point are you titillated or enjoying the violence at all. but also i think this is such a master class in uh i don't want to be cynical about it because it's one of those things where the the truth is stranger than fiction like the it's almost like the whole dating show element because no one gets murdered in it right is almost a thematic sequence it's almost there to to make us reflect back on ourselves right not only was this guy a brutal statistic killer he fucking won game shows by being charming right yeah and the movie doesn't open with cheryl and it doesn't close with cheryl and cheryl has no impact on rodney alcalor on his arrest no on his murders nothing on.

His internal motivations on his feelings no.

She manages.

To avoid him but she does not change him.

And it takes a much younger girl who's been, I'm going to, look, as a survivor of sex abuse myself, I feel like it's very clearly coded that she has come from abuse and knows what she's doing in relation to abusers.

I think he chooses people who have clearly come from something and or are running from something like that because it's, that is who society, A, they're already falling between the cracks, but also B, society won't believe. like they're much less likely to believe somebody quote-unquote like that.

Yeah and.

So he targets them.

And this film like the others does open with you know like double indemnity opens with we're dealing with a killer we know exactly who the villain is what he does yep with the long goodbye it's opening with the bloody knuckles only devil in the blue dress do we not open with the villains and we open on easy but easy does commit a transgression uh i think it's interesting here how the the film plays cheryl's character anna kendrick's character cheryl because only at the end of that sequence of that storyline of him appearing on the game show are we worried for her safety we're not worried for her safety when she's in a live tv studio other than we know that she's gonna pick him.

Yeah well we we see her go on another bad date right where it's a date where you're like oh don't sleep with this guy but it's a very different type of thing like which i think is fascinating that the full presents that we see her like trying and failing to make it as an actor We see her in an audition with some like, again, douchebags, but we see her in other contexts. And yeah, we're like, oh, this is but we're not worried for her until suddenly we are.

Until she's been so smitten by him. And again, I think, I don't know if the actual episode of The Dating Game that Rodney Alcala appeared on plays like this, but she's told initially by the amazing host played by Tony Hale to dumb it down.

Hey, can you do me a favor? Yeah. Okay. You're an intelligent girl. Anyone can see that. When you get on that stage, though, I don't want you to play so smart. All right? The guys are getting intimidated. You know, boys, they're babies. Right. So I just, that's right. I just need you to laugh and smile just over and over. Oh. Can you do that for me? Yeah, sure. I appreciate it. Of course. There you go. You have a beautiful smile.

At a certain point, she starts to just have fun with it and is smart. and she's tearing down these men's egos. And it's because he knows how to play that game that he wins, that she's attracted to him, interested in him, et cetera. But I do think the film enforces her worldview of being smart is being good.

Which is what Walter does, right?

Yeah.

Oh, I'm smart. I can beat this. I understand this. I can get away with it. And then he can't. And then she very closely doesn't.

And and i think she learns that like i think well.

It's why she leaves la right where.

She does.

Learn from this.

I don't know if it's connected it possibly is connected i mean you you almost got murdered by someone you were on a game show with because you made a poor choice right definitely connected but her having the courage to quit acting to quit trying and to leave la it's definitely connected to that experience but i don't think it's like a direct corollary to her going oh it's not like her going i'm gonna go and be with people from you know let's say a working class or agricultural background i'm gonna stop judging people intellectually it wasn't like sure that connected but she definitely changes from this experience uh does rodney change right, No. He lets one go.

Well, no. Yes. Okay.

No, I'm playing devil's advocate here. I agree.

He doesn't permanently let her go, right? Like, the idea is that he... Yes, he says, okay, let's go back.

He doesn't murder her. He unties her.

Sure. They get in the car. It's a wonderfully filmed sequence where they stop at a four-way stop, and there's some dude in a pickup truck, and he's watching her to see if she tries to signal and ask for help to this guy. And then he stops at a, like, a quickie mart or, like, a roadside place and says, do you want anything? And the clear indication is that he has let his guard down enough so that he thinks she's not trying to run. But to me, because again, and again, this is real life. He, at other points, had resuscitated other victims and then murdered them after, which also happens, again, the opening scene of the film. So it becomes very clear that he has not let her go. He's toying with her. He's going to take her back to somewhere else where he has control, where he can regain himself, and that then he can murder her. And she escapes in that process.

Oh you certainly don't feel like she's safe.

No no point in his.

Presence like she hasn't like changed him internally like he has just been able she has facilitated him resisting his compulsion for.

A period of time yeah so.

I agree with you uh i don't think he's changed but it's interesting that.

No and and he will go on to do that again yeah and and and he did again i mean the post script he gets let out on bail and kills two more people yeah yeah like at no point do you feel that he even has a desire to change let alone changes um which is interesting because does cheryl change yes is cheryl the main character no at no point and i think that the ending again to me is very noir he doesn't change the system doesn't change this is fucked and it continues to be fucked Yeah. The best you can do is survive.

You know, the why now is we take a story out of the 70s and it just feels like it could happen today.

And again, this is about writing, and it's not about directing. But I think that this is a very, very underrated film and how well it is directed to depict those themes. I mean, I mentioned it in the same breath as Zodiac and Memories of Murder, and I think it belongs there. And I don't think either of them treated the victims as well as this film does either. And I think that morally and socially, like dealing with a real life story and doing it with this sort of deft touch as a director is incredibly difficult. And to do it while you're acting in it. Now, Anna Kendrick was not originally attached to direct. She was attached only to act. And essentially, the director was unable to continue. and the film would have fallen over had she not directed, which says a lot more about the studio system and needing a big name than anything. The fact that she did this as her debut while being in it is fucking insane. And genuinely, David Fincher and Bong Joon-ho could never.

Yeah.

Like, to be in it.

Yes.

As well as to direct it is wild.

And I don't think those, you know, I'm definitely not calling either of those two directors misogynists.

Oh, no, no, no, I'm not doing that.

But they are quite, they have brands of masculinity, I think, that comes through in their work. And I think this film works because of the women behind the camera, even though it's written, the credited writer is a man.

That depth of understanding. And look, I mean, not to say that, and I do not on any level believe that you need to have experience with abuse to direct something about abuse. But Kendrick took this project very seriously because of her, which she has discussed, history of dealing with certain types of abuse. and I think it's very noir. Noir is sympathetic to the victims.

Yeah, even in Double Indemnity, the rich, annoying husband who's murdered, like, you feel sorry for him when he's strangled in the car.

The worst thing he did was be a little bit like he travelled a lot and didn't pay as much attention to his murderous wife. I mean, he didn't know she was a murderer as he should. Like, that's the worst thing he did, you know?

Uh makes you feel sorry for nino as well the uh very.

Yeah future abusive husband like you're like god you're you're a bit of an asshole but like do you deserve to be you know framed for murder no.

And i think the long goodbye which we should mention has a fucking amazing uncredited uh appearance by arnold schwarzenegger.

I enjoy that so much because like again this is one of those things where i'm like oh i've seen this a bunch of times everyone and then all of a sudden out of nowhere you text me arnold schwarzenegger exclamation but i was like oh yeah just this randomly massive house of a dude walks in the room and you're like oh jesus with.

A very 70s mustache um but the the film i was gonna say has a lot of sympathy both marlo because anyone who doesn't infringe his code he has sympathy with whether they're rich poor criminal non-criminal, he has sympathy and the film correspondingly also has sympathy with those characters.

I think and this ties back to what i said with devinol and blue dress right where you're like oh you're a woman in this position i will help you like women and children especially but like anyone who doesn't have power in society the noir detective's code is like i will help you, All right.

And we have already, like, just while we've picked three films with male detectives, Woman of the Hours, obviously not that, but, like, to see all these troops played out with very perfectly with a female detective lead, check out Destroyer, which we've also done on the podcast before. It is great. Okay. So, Mel, as a huge lover of noir, have you learned anything new from this analysis?

I, I mean, every time, every time I revisit some of these films, you, you see new things. I really enjoyed tying the, like, just the fact that you're able to draw these sorts of connections between, you know, like an insurance salesman and a post-war, you know, a GI, like all of those sorts of things are really fascinating. And I think writing characters that are assholes, but are completely relatable and understandable is one of the trickiest things to do. And so I loved this, right? And I loved seeing, again, sometimes you get so familiar with something, and Double Indemnity is probably one of those, that you miss some of the things, someone coming to it. So I really loved hearing yours and Anna's reactions live as well.

Look Anna loved all of these films which I was surprised with obviously Woman of the Hour was the most confronting experience but she came out she enjoyed watching Devil in the Blue Dress but came out unhappy at the end yeah.

Genuinely I think a lot of people come out more unhappy at the end.

Yeah and I think it's the nihilism whereas the nihilism in The Long Goodbye it is very nihilistic ending but it's like an upbeat nihilism like he's playing the harmonica and I'm like just killed my But he got what he deserved. I'm going to move on. I hope most of my landings have come through with this. I hope people who don't care for Noir have got something from this. Uh. I think these films have got really strong control over the questions and that's how they get us to follow, compelling us to follow characters who are doing terrible things. And sometimes it's removing the mystery. We know who did it in Woman of the Hour.

Yep.

Opens with him murdering someone.

Yep.

And then it becomes like concern for Cheryl. Like, don't be stupid, Cheryl. It's like that leaning forward. word and.

That distinction between worldview of the movie.

And worldview.

Of like um the characters or like society and.

Like how.

Those can all be three different levers you pull.

I think was.

Really great to concentrate on watching all of these but specifically something like when we're there where you're like oh actually this is a real life story.

Yeah and.

How do you come out of that feeling differently about a character than you do about the system and etc.

And i you know i thought that they would be different in each of the films that that these characters worldviews and the film's worldviews would differ but i found in devil in the blue dress they aligned and it worked yep equally well to be honest.

I think they probably align in a vast majority of private detective noir specifically um again that's.

Very very broad strokes and look there i think there are plenty of noir and neo-noir films or films that use the trappings the style it will feel noir because it has a detective and it has venetian blinds and it has fedoras and it has voiceovers and it has femme fatales and they might not have what we're talking about which is this characters who are trapped by their own transgressions uh coming up against insurmountable powers or systems and, having a nihilistic ending. And so, those things can be in Hell or High Water or Sicario or other films that I love. They can be in, you know, Blade Runner. And it can be, like you said, the third genre where it's layered over the top of a Western, a melodrama, a- Sci-fi. Science fiction, a comedy.

Yep.

I'm sure there is a comedy noir out there.

Of course. There's straight up comedy that's also noir, you know.

As opposed to dark films that are funny, which is very different, different again.

Anyway. Yes. Look, genuinely, I could do this forever.

Well, thank you so much, Mel, for a joy, you know, doing the homework again.

I'll be honest. This is the least homework I've probably ever done for a Draft Zero video. I went, I will rewatch these movies. Great. That's it.

But also just for making more Draft Zero happen. If you hadn't pitched in, if you hadn't engaged with us in planning the homework, It wouldn't have happened at all. So the other thing that makes more Draft Zero happen more often are amazing Patreons. So thank you, Patreons.

While you bring that up, I will also shout out the AFLW, because a lot of the planning for this episode has happened during the AFLW.

Yeah. Do you want to tell our non-Australian listeners what the AFLW is?

Oh, footy, also known as Aussie Rules, which is not the same as football, which is definitely not the same as rugby. um it is one of the greatest sports in the world and you should get stuck in.

Thank you as always to our amazing patreons crob these sandra jesse randy paolo thomas jen malay alexandra and lily wow that list is growing that's nice um i'm glad that these told us how to pronounce his name apparently it's thesis but without the is at the end there's.

A lot of great noir names in there Randy and Alexandra, excellent.

Mm-hmm.

Excellent.

Okay, thank you, Mel.

I hope you all feel like arguing with either Stu or myself about anything on this episode or anything in general. And you can find many ways of getting in touch with us at our website at draft-zero.com. At the website, you'll also find the show notes for this and all our other episodes, as well as links to support us and spread the word for free via a rating and review on Apple Podcasts. Very important for spreading the word. Or if you think that what we do here is worth a dollar or preferably more than a dollar, then you can also find links to our Patreon page to support us getting these episodes to you quicker. Thanks. And thanks for listening.