#28: Girlfriend Week
Showing my boyfriend Cell Block Tango and the Hand Flex, etc.
When I pitched Girlfriend Week (in which Adam would watch 7 Girlfriend Classics of my choosing—you can read Boyfriend Week for more on the origins of this project, and the 1/3rd of Red Dead Redemption I played) I had only a loose sense of programming.
I’m pretty sure the project first occurred to me when Adam mentioned offhand that he’d never seen The Devil Wears Prada, a movie I have seen approximately 800 times. The other motivating factor was wanting Adam to watch Chicago. It’s important to me that he be familiar with Catherine Zeta-Jones’s electrifying turn in Cell Block Tango (specifically timestamps 5:44 and 6:01). From there, the list came together rather quickly—I needed a high school classic (the best one, 10 Things I Hate About You which as a bonus also slots into the category Modern Teen Shakespeare Adaptations), a Baz (Moulin Rouge!, a sleepover classic for me specifically because my best middle school friend Connie was in love with Ewan McGregor, which edged out Romeo + Juliet, even though I prefer R+J), an Austen (Joe Wright’s immaculate Pride & Prejudice), and Twilight, duh.1
That left one slot, which I spent days puzzling over. Really, I should have plugged in The Notebook as the resident romantic weepie. I had even said early on that we would watch The Notebook. It’s oft-referenced! It’s got Gena Rowlands in a role that tragically reflected reality, directed by her son! It resulted in the iconic Rachel McAdams/Ryan Gosling 2005 MTV Movie Awards kiss! Adam loves to say “If you’re a bird, I’m a bird” unprompted! I really was going to do it, but in the end I couldn’t get past the fact that I just don’t like The Notebook that much, even though McAdams/Gosling have dynamite chemistry and James Marsden is lovely and handsome and sympathetic in it. Decent movie for what it is! But it’s just so corny.
I would have done Bring It On but I had just watched it on an airplane and I was too selfish to rewatch. Bring It On was not a particular staple of my childhood but god it’s good. Baby Kiki Dunst nailing “peppy but lovable”, Eliza Dushku doing a flip, Gabrielle Union!!!!, a surprisingly ahead of its time cultural appropriation plot that resolves the way you’d hope, dreamy love interest Cliff Pantone jumping around his bedroom shredding on his guitar (this is the best a boy can look) and brushing his teeth with Kirsten Dunst.
In the end, I narrowed down the 7th slot competitors rather arbitrarily to: The Notebook, Hairspray (perfect, but it would be the 3rd movie musical in the line-up), Bend It Like Beckham (genuinely wonderful! Gurinder Chadha is not loved enough!), 13 Going on 30 (huge in the canon, but ultimately The Devil Wears Prada got my magazine working girl vote), and Bridget Jones’s Diary (really good movie that has Shirley Henderson in it). I pitched these to Adam, and having secured an assurance that he would watch Hairspray someday, we landed on…
…Bridget Jones’s Diary, for the immensely boyfriend reason that he likes a Comedy Bang Bang bit where Lily Sullivan plays Bridget Jones and for the girlfriend reason that when Christmas arrives, London calls to me and also I’d become fixated on a plan where we got lamb scotch eggs at Lord’s and then watched Bridget Jones’s Diary.
I originally intended to conduct entrance/exit interviews with Adam for each movie and simply take notes but Adam being Adam (audio producer, tinkerer, annoying), he insisted on conducting audio interviews. Even though adding a complicated audio element to Girlfriend Week is very Boyfriend, I think Adam did a nice job editing them all and they provide an uncomfortably intimate look into the way we talk to each other when nobody is around (in short, a lot more singing than you’d expect).
So without further ado, here is a chronological accounting of Girlfriend Week, with audios included along with summaries. Each audio combines an intro/exit interview:
10 Things I Hate About You (dir. Gil Junger, 1999)
This was high up on Adam’s list for what he was most excited to watch, as it should be—Karen McCullah and Kirsten Smith (who’d go on to write Legally Blonde) reimagine The Taming of the Shrew as a high school rom-com with every trope executed perfectly—iconic soundtrack, a big romantic gesture from a heartthrob (THE heartthrob, young Heath Ledger, singing “Cant Take My Eyes Off You” and dancing along the bleachers), a tour of high school cliques (including: White Rastas, cowboys, Ivy League-bound baby day traders), a pivotal Big Party (hosted by the terrifically named Bogey Lowenstein), a pivotal Prom, and an ill-considered bet to drive the plot. What really makes the movie is how it brims with background gags and insane peripheral character beats. I remembered liking Allison Janney as a guidance counselor who spends most of her time writing erotic fiction but I’d forgotten about say, David Krumholtz as a nerdy but confident wheeler and dealer who gets a third tier romantic subplot where he dresses up like Shakespeare for prom to take out the Shakespeare obsessed Susan May Pratt (of Center Stage fame). Around a solid emotional core (Julia Stiles’ misanthropic, defensive feminist Kat opening up to love/Ledger falling for her for real/two sisters learning to be there for each other despite their opposite personalities), this movie fleshes out a whole lively high school universe stuffed with considered little jokes and details that make this movie endlessly entertaining and entirely unlike the slop we get now.
Adam’s assessment was essentially the same, only he is far less enamored of the Letters to Cleo-heavy soundtrack and in the weeks that followed, it didn’t hold up too well for him (insane). Adam’s score: 3.5/5. Mine: 4.5/5
Chicago (dir. Rob Marshall, 2002)
There’s a hyper competent slickness to Chicago and Rob Marshall’s studied, beat for beat aping of Bob Fosse’s cinematic style that’s tempting to write off as hollow mimicry but the thing about Chicago is that while its no Cabaret, it is still one of the best acted, choreographed, photographed, and edited movie musicals of the last two decades. The fact that so few films look this good and move with such smooth rapidity is a reminder to me that it is very, very, very, VERY hard to make a movie look this easy. That it slides down like enjoyable nothing is in fact a towering achievement. To be clear, I do think about this movie all the time, not for its themes of crime and celebrity and corruption (whatever!) but because everybody in this looks HOT and every performance is remarkable, particularly Catherine Zeta-Jones in a ferocious role that would earn her a well deserved Oscar. Every musical number is expertly lit and framed to show you the DANCING (remember how this is possible?) and so unafraid of movie musical magic by way of artifice.
Adam did not love this movie on first watch—I think he was thrown by the breakneck speed, barreling from number to number, and its relative thematic shallowness but it also grew and grew in his estimation and landed a plum spot in his final ranking. Also, the “They Both Reached for the Gun” sequence inspired me and Adam’s marionette Halloween costume this year. Adam’s score: 4/5, Mine: 4.5/5
Moulin Rouge! (dir. Baz Luhrmann, 2001)
The best way I can describe my relationship to Moulin Rouge! is with the now ancient meme Kombucha Girl.
Probably Moulin Rouge! is one of the great masterpieces of the turn of the new century, a totally singular vision by an artist nobody can imitate, a jukebox musical that captures the recursive, referential excess of our times. The movie always lives well in my mind—a manic and stunning Nicole Kidman, Ewan McGregor at his floppiest haired and most doe eyed, “Elephant Love Medley”!! but every time I come back around and actually watch the movie I am reminded that it is so! annoying!!!! John Leguizamo is so annoying in this!!!! It’s Trader Joe’s Bag-core in the way most repellent to my sensibilities. I forget every single time that portions of this movie make me feel like I’m being shaken to death. I also forget how much Christian is drip city as a secret boyfriend, but McGregor always wins me back with his cutie pie little smile. Even now, I’m sitting here and I can’t remember exactly what it is I don’t like, I can only remember how undeniable this movie is in the end. Jim Broadbent and Richard Roxburgh in particular are operating in the exact right stratosphere of high energy ham, but what can I say, I love to hear snippets of 20 good songs mashed up, I love the choreo in “El Tango de Roxanne,” I love the color red and looking at Nicole Kidman and I love LOVE.
Adam was really excited for this one but it quickly became apparent that he hated it. Every theater kid instinct that’s kept him at arm’s length from the genre at large is out in full force in Moulin Rouge! He kept saying “they can’t do that” before characters would begin speaking lyrics to a song they were about to sing (by the way, in our day to day life, Adam does this all the time). He did not like “Elephant Love Medley” but he did let me play the mega version from the musical out loud after the movie ended and had to watch me sing it in the living room (a performance he called “surprisingly committed”). I just really like when they sing a little “Such Great Heights.”2 Adam’s score: 2.5/5, Mine: 4/5
Twilight (dir. Catherine Hardwicke, 2008)
I hated Twilight as a book-devoted Team Edward tween in ‘08, but since a rewatch in 2020 I’ve slowly been working my way from a begrudging respect for the grungy aesthetic, lived in high school humor, and the uniquely horny and bizarre work of Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart as Edward Cullen and Bella Swan toward a firm belief that this weird movie is kind of brilliant. As Bella, Stewart spends the whole movie panting and trembling from how much she wants to KISS (and more…) Edward and Pattinson is as stilted and bizarre as a gorgeous 108 year old with dangerous bloodlust might be. They want to kiss each other so bad!!!! I’m sorry, I’m with this Mormon Muse superfan—denial is sexy! The best part of this movie is a) the soundtrack (so so perfect. Have you ever heard “Full Moon” by Black Ghosts?) and b) the high school side characters (“How you likin’ the rain girl?” “Look Bella! It’s a worm”) but “Supermassive Black Hole” vampire baseball is fabulous too (only it kickstarts the boring action plot of the last third of the film).
Adam was very excited for this one, and liked it as much as I’d have hoped. It’s an interesting flick! Taylor Lautner’s wig is awful! I agree this movie loses steam once they’re together/when the Cam Gigandet tracker stuff kicks in. An important thing to know about Adam is that he LOVES the post about Edward texting Bella “saw a snail today… effervescent.” Adam’s score: 3.5/5, Mine: 4.5/5
The Devil Wears Prada (dir. David Frankel, 2006)
To put it in hyper modern parlance, this movie feels like Conclave to me—immensely watchable, bitchy and every performance is a notch better than you might expect in a movie like this (I don’t care if Conclave thinks it’s prestige, it’s SILLY and FUN) and also Stanley Tucci is there. Tucci’s amazing in this movie. When he’s giddy about his new job? I cry! I’ve genuinely watched this movie too many times to make any kind of objective assessment, I like 00s magazines as a setting, I was very much like Andy when I was younger (book smart, superiority complex, wore ugly outfits on purpose as a Statement) and wanted to be her (have a boyfriend with curly hair, I’m SORRY I thought Adrian Grenier was so cute when I was a kid) and I can watch this movie anytime, anywhere, and have a good time.
Adam wasn’t particularly excited for this one and ultimately found it fine/very watchable. Adam says the real villain is Miranda Priestly, for being a mean boss and betraying Tucci. Fair enough. Adam’s score: 3.5/5, Mine: 4/5
Pride & Prejudice (dir. Joe Wright, 2005)
This is the best film on this list, a perfect adaptation of a perfect novel. One of the best things a work of art can have is a warm house full of noisy sisters.3 Joe Wright has always had maybe the best sense of movement of any working director, and this film is fluid and graceful and suffused with a peaceful light, all with that Dario Marinelli score. It is the best music to listen to during a quiet walk through a sun dappled park. Every performance here is great—it’s easy to sing the praises of Tom Hollander as the blowhard (but nice!) cousin proclaiming “What excellent boiled potatoes” or Donald Sutherland tearing up with joy when he realizes his favorite daughter has found her match or Matthew Macfadyen’s famous hand flex—but I’m not always sure Keira Knightley gets enough credit! I love her and her stubbornly set jaw! She’s so winning!
This movie was in fact Adam’s least anticipated of the week (“week”), as someone who doesn’t much like period films and straight romances, but lo and behold, the power of Joe Wright and Jane Austen (god she’s good) is too great—this was his favorite of the lot. Damn straight. Adam’s score: 4.5/5, Mine: 5/5
Bridget Jones’s Diary (dir. Sharon Maguire, 2001)
Among other reasons (Comedy Bang Bang, wanting to eat British food for a dinner-and-movie combo), I liked the idea of following up Pride and Prejudice with this loose adaptation. I love this movie, but I haven’t seen it as many times as the others on this list and I can never remember how badly the weight stuff has aged —that Bridget is 136 lbs (skinny!!!!) and spends much of the movie/her diary worrying about losing 20 lbs (dangerous!!!) but the saving grace is how deeply this movie loves Bridget. She’s worries about her weight because it was 2001, possibly the worst time in history to be above 110 lbs as a woman (again, DANGEROUS/not a thing!). She’s worried about her job and being single and being a mess and not knowing how to cook. This movie threatens to slip into an “it’s wine o’clock/adulting is hard” thing, but Bridget is funny and charming and sexy and her best friends love her (friends: Shirley Henderson, who needs 200 more minutes of screen time so I can hear that voice, Sally Phillips who Adam recognized from Taskmaster and James Callis, very funny as a former one-hit wonder) and in the end, despite her many insecurities, is confident enough to stand up for herself. The two times she gets it together to extricate herself from the grasp of her charming cad of a boss/boyfriend Daniel Cleaver (prime Hugh Grant) are immensely satisfying. I tear up when she says his “Ah sure, what the hell” approach to their relationship is “not a good enough offer for me.” Yes!!!! Ultimately I find this movie’s insistence that Bridget—who cooks inedible blue soup and doesn’t read the news and wears inappropriate shirts to an office setting—deserves to be loved exactly as she is very moving. My mother and I also famously find the line “His wife was Japanese. Cruel race.” super funny. We’re allowed!!
Adam was thrown by a) British Renee Zellweger and b) the concept of Colin Firth as a love interest due to his familiarity with The King’s Speech Firth rather than ‘95 Pride and Prejudice Firth, which is crazy to me, but he liked it a lot! Adam’s score: 4/5, Mine: 4/5
Conclusions
Here’s Adam’s final ranking:
Pride and Prejudice
Chicago
Bridget Jones’s Diary
10 Things I Hate About You
Twilight
The Devil Wears Prada
Moulin Rouge!
My ranking (very similar) (with the caveat that I like them all and I’m aware this is unfair to Baz on the level of artistic achievement):
Pride and Prejudice
10 Things I Hate About You
Chicago
Bridget Jones’s Diary
Twilight
The Devil Wears Prada
Moulin Rouge!
Generally speaking, Adam’s a very amiable watcher of films but the great push of my life will be trying to get him to watch any 19th century set British romances (specifically Jane Eyre) and the great push of his life will be trying to get me to finish Red Dead Redemption (we’ll see…). For the curious, I made a list with GF week movies and a bunch of movies I either considered, or would have considered had Adam not already seen them. Adam has assured me the following (plus Hairspray) will be watched in the imminent future with relative enthusiasm: Bright Star, Cuaron’s A Little Princess, A Room with a View, An Unmarried Woman, Crossing Delancey.
For the record, Adam has already seen: Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist (vital, but he doesn’t like it), Across the Universe (vital, but he doesn’t like it), the work of Nora Ephron, the work of Nancy Meyers, the best of Julia Roberts’ rom coms (Adam went through a phase in deep 2020 where he was constantly watching the musical number that opens My Best Friend’s Wedding), Mean Girls, Legally Blonde, Center Stage (VITAL), Clueless.
I actually despise The Postal Service’s singing voices (sorry) but really like this song and would benefit enormously from a straight Glee-style cover of the song by Karen Olivo and Aaron Tveit. This is the kind of thing I would work to commission if I were a billionaire.
I once told Adam the perfect amount of kids to have is 1 boy and 1 girl or 4-5 daughters and he was lightly aghast.
“stoker, more like kill her” is an objectively insane thing to say. and THATS the magic of girlfriend week
i can’t even imagine moulin rouge being a slog…literally the most exciting movie ever made…………