George? Yes Joe. You know what I like about sports? Absolutely nothing. Say it again! I don't know why, but I've never been into watching sports. I go to the gym and try to keep myself in shape, but that's where my athletic interests end. Yeah, I'm not into sports either. There are things that, if I wasn't good at it right away, I just gave up on it completely and I was good at zero sports, so I never got into it. You know, there are lots of sportas out there. Weird ones, actually. Did you know wife-carrying was a sport? I mean, if I had picked kid up and carried her over the threshold, I would have been engaging in a sport. You would have to run with her, but yes. We recorded as an early June and a next championship wife-carrying competition is in late June in British Columbia. However, I could tell you last year's winners were Tessito Menatin and Kajita Kovan of Finland. They won the race in 66.4 seconds. Kid asked me if I was going to carry her over to the threshold, and I'm like, no, because there's two steps down into our apartment and that's a safety hazard. Well, you need to be braver, George. That was very cowardly on your part. You should have said that. I will carry you regardless of how many stairs that confront us. Anyway, now, George, I wanted you to take a look at this video that is linked in the show notes and tell me what you think of wife-carrying. Okay. Dorking. Sorry. United Kingdom. 16th UK wife-carrying race. Mount your partners. There's a guy standing there unwisely with a camera facing this line of men carrying their wives. How would a care with how some of these guys carry their wives? They're upside down with legs. It's basically a reverse-69ing with what's going on there. Yeah, using the backing your head. The women's legs are wrapped around their necks and the women's face of their butts. Okay. What's that? Why? Why is the one couple doing it with her facing forward? There's only one couple where the cut. She's just piggybacking. Everyone else is like, the legs are around the guy's neck. Oh, that's kind of so uncomfortable to have people dumping water right on your crotch like that. I presume it must make you run faster that way, having the girls upside down and you right side up. I mean, I guess it's easier to... Okay, so from a balance perspective, I could see why that would be the case because if you have somebody up on your shoulders above your head, then your center of gravity has shifted. I just applied way more intellect than this sport deserves. Are we watching these people do this in slow motion? I mean, I appreciate a good slow motion girl butt jiggle, but this is not how I appreciate that. Hey, this is a real sport. You have to be shaped to do this. I appreciate the PPE aspect that the wives are wearing helmets, but their head is right by their husband's sweaty ass crack. What makes you think it hasn't been there before? That's fair. You don't know what kind of sexies people have. They have British sex. That's how they have British sex. British sex, which means it's very stiff. They just, it's all missionary. We should have asked much about that. What kind of sex do you have? What was the word? What was the word that you were so adamant on correcting? Nikola. Yeah, Nikola. She, what was the word? She said it wrong. She's British and I don't know how to speak about British. She said it. I forget what the word was. I, I do too. I just wish I didn't. Anyway, we're talking about Margie from Scott the Total Decay. He was at the Georgia's wedding. Yep, unintentionally. He didn't. What's happening? That's the price of the best. So do I have to watch this whole seven minutes for this? No, I don't have to. Oh, okay. Stop it any time you watch it. I think the race is over. The race is over. Okay. So what do you think? I don't know. It looks like they won a thing of Tabasco sauce. Probably. What do you, would you ever engage in a sport yourself? Um, I mean, the price would have to be better than Tabasco sauce. I would as long as Kit was on board. I would certainly give it a go. The only thing I wonder about this is things to be very heteronormative. Like in the lesbian scene, I love the miss. There was no big burly bear on the back of some happy gay twink. No, no. No gay. So, I mean, can I gay? I presume people with homosexual can be involved. I mean, it's called wife-carrying. Yeah, but yeah, it's not spouse-carrying. They probably should change the spouse-carrying to being more inclusive. They probably should. Yes. Well, all right. That's enough. Let's get into this show. Okay. I'm going to does this still work. The pockets are always in ass. Does this still work? I'm Joe Dixon. And I'm George Romaka. And today we're discussing Love and Basketball from 2000 and some historical context. First, podcast-y stuff. You can reach us at dtswpod@gmail.com, Facebook, Letterboxed, and on our YouTube channel. Joe is on bluesky@chodexon.bsky.social. Please tell your friends about us, even the ones who didn't lock their fucking windows. And leave five-star ratings everywhere. You can pick what we watch and get extra per episode content by funding us on Patreon for as little as a dollar a month at patreon.com/ttswpod. And please do that. I'm married now. That means life is more expensive. I think... Well, just having the kids make your life more expensive, regardless of your marriage status. You know something I just realized, this movie really should have had a theme song, like a Bond movie, they would have a song to it to the title. This should have been a song for Love and Basketball sung by Prince or something. Love and Basketball. Love and Basketball. Go together like a hand and a billiards ball. Hand and a billiards ball. Okay. I couldn't come up with anything else. That's what happened. That's what came out of my brain and we're stuck with it now. So Joe, take us back to 2000. Dearly beloved, we are here today to look at some basketball and love from the year 2000. Since the movie we are talking about is set in California, that region will be the focus of this history corner. Dennis Haybert plays a retired basketball player for the Los Angeles Clippers in this film. What was up with the Clippers in 2000? I got this off Wikipedia. The 2000-2001 season brought changes. Derek Strong was sent to the Orlando Magic in exchange for Corey Maygette. And the draft rights to Kia and Newling. The Clippers, two draft picks that year, were childhood friends from Illinois, high schooler Darius Samiles, third overall pick, and Quentin Richardson, 18th overall pick. The team became popular among fans with its high flying style of basketball, and the Clippers did improve slightly, registering a 31-51 record. The team also led the NBA in bench scoring with 37 points per game. In quote, "Is bench scoring when they sit on the bench and play fantasy basketball and win that way?" That's where I was going with this. Okay. What the hell is bench scoring? I don't know what bench scoring is. Ladies and gentlemen, please write in and explain to us non-sports fans. The hell is bench score? How do you score from the bench? I don't know what that means. Anyway, but the real big deal in basketball in Los Angeles in the year 2000 was the Lakers. George, read this headline from the Santa Clarita signal. "Shacktacular." Unanimous series MVP, Shaquille O'Neal scores 41 points as Lakers win championship. The center's Lakers defeated the Indiana Pacers in six games with a score of 116-111. Shaquille O'Neal and Kobe Bryant win the star players of these games. O'Neal was named the finals most value player. I will quote from the article. The victory gave coach Phil Jackson his seventh title, his first without Michael Jordan, and just his first season coaching and Lakers team that had been ousted from the playoffs in each of the first three seasons since O'Neal and Bryant arrived. End quote. Evidently, this victory started the beginning of a streak for the Lakers under coach Phil Jackson. The Lakers would go on to win five championships during this period. In 2001, the Lakers swept their first three series and won the founders against the Philadelphia 76ers and five games, fishing with unprecedented 15-1 record. The best postseason record in NBA history at the time. Okay, that's basketball. Let's do love, which is exciting and new. Come aboard. We're expecting you. I'm going to read these headlines about these big name, Hollywood companies who got married in 2000, where it happened and the price tag. This first one is from ABC News and it says simply, "Pit, Aniston, wed, and Malibu." The article reads, "Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston tied the knot Saturday in a lab sunset ceremony that reported cost one million dollars." About 200 guests attended the nuptials at a Southern California bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean. From the Sacramento Bee, Douglas Zeta-Jones had Ritzy wedding. Quoting, "Choose the old-fashioned glamour over privacy, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones were married Saturday night in an extravagant wedding at the Clazo Hotel on New York Central Park." Douglas and Zeta-Jones probably spent $2 million for the Gala Black Tie affair. This is from BBC News, Madonna wins her guy. Quoting, "Madonna and movie director Guy Ritchie were married at Skibbo Castle on Friday night. The minister who conducted the ceremony has confirmed. This is not in the article, but the nuptials appeared to have hit a price tag of $2.1 million." Of these three, as of this recording, Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones are the only ones still married. George, you just tied the knot. Yep, you had a small ceremony. Yep, I've had friends who've gotten married in very small intimate affairs while others were lavish. I think the most expensive wedding I ever attended was a Radio City music hole. My own personal preference if I ever got married is to keep it small. I can't imagine being a millionaire, but even if I was, I would never spend that much on my wedding. Of course, I would have to run this by the person I'm marrying, but I would not want anything too crazy. If you had tons of financial resources, George, will you have done something more elaborate? We're going to do something more elaborate next year with more financial resources. So you would have spent a million on the wedding if you had it? Probably not a million dollars, though. I think if I had a million dollars, I could think of way better things for me to do with it than to spend it on a wedding, like spending it on resources to make sure the marriage is solid. Like, "Hey, we own our home now. We don't have to think about a mortgage. Holy shit, that's a lot of pressure off of us." Well, that is the number one reason people get divorced. It's not affairs. It's not laws. It's not all that it's the financial pressure that they both face and sometimes they just turn on each other when it happens and it hurts the marriage. Did they be fair to these people, though? Some of this money goes into security, which they need and to keep the paparazzi out, especially something like Madonna. I'm sure they probably have helicopters flying over the place trying to get pictures. So I can see why some of that goes into that. That's why I cost so much, but still, like, a million dollars, 2.1 million. Wow, I just couldn't do it. This is coming from a guy who likes soap operas. I know you don't really watch soap operas, George, but I love them. And boy, did they have elaborate weddings and soap operas. Characters who seemingly could not possibly afford what they were doing at these huge matches they were married in and they had characters taking them to the weddings and stuff like, "How do you afford all of this?" But the soap operas, so logic doesn't apply. Okay, George, tell us about love and basketball. Okay, this was written and directed by Gina Prince Blythewood. And I don't know if we've just missed it for a lot of episodes, but we haven't been mentioning when things are in the national film registry. I don't think a lot of what we've been talking about the last couple of weeks has been in the national film. A couple of weeks. I can't remember the last time we talked about it. It's been a long time. It's been a long time. I don't think many of the films we've done have. I don't think any of them have it, because you would have mentioned it. No, there was a time where we were doing movies exclusively from the national film registry, but in 2023, this film was selected for preservation in the United States national film registry by the Library of Congress as being culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant. Which begs the question, what happened to the color purple? Surely that should be in there, right? I don't think it is yet. Yeah. How did this movie get there and that color purple? Way more significant, frankly, from my opinion anyway. I don't know, maybe next year we'll revive our campaign if we have enough listeners to maybe swing the needle. But Gina Prince Blythewood is a black woman, so it's nice to see her get into the national film registry. Oh, sure. I'm not and she's young. So I'm sure she has a bright career out of her. Well, this is from 2000, so a career has already been a half. Well, yes, 24 years. That is true. She's directed 21 films. Oh, okay. Blurbs IMDB says Monica and Quincy love and play basketball together through many life challenges from childhood to adulthood. Okay, sure. Sure. YouTube from the time they were kidding YouTube and no parentheses to be found. From the time they were kids, Monica and Quincy were meant to be together. Over the course of two decades, they have an on again off again relationship while pursuing their mutual dream careers in basketball. They play the same game and share the same dream. All is fair in love and basketball. I don't know about that last line, but okay. Yeah, sure. I mean, they do use that line twice in the movie. Yeah, they do and didn't make any sense there either. So the film opens to studio logos and then the film title in handwriting over Al Green's love and happiness. Then we get a title card for first quarter 1981. This film is a four act drama broken up into quarters like a basketball game. The only quibble I have with this is that these quarters are in our watching time and in the chronology of the movie wildly uneven. I would second that in 1981, the Wright family moves into the neighborhood next door to the McCall family. Young Quincy McCall is playing basketball with his friends in his driveway. His new neighbor, young Monica Wright asks to play. After some initial confusion about Monica's gender, they divide into teams. That was a fun little moment. It didn't make any sense. I mean, maybe because I'm just an old man now, but it's clearly a little girl. I'm just like, how these boys can tell that was a girl? I don't know. I saw this movie originally in the theaters. I don't remember what my reaction was then, but watching back on it, I'm like, how do you not know that's a girl? And I wrote this a while ago. I don't remember how often the mother would get on Monica about the way she looks, but she was never not a beautiful young woman. Yeah, you could always tell she was a woman. She did not, despite what her mother may have thought in this movie, she never butched herself up. I mean, her gender was very evident. Monica is as good or better than Quincy, who gets frustrated and fouls Monica into the grass, where her face is lacerated on a rock, I guess. I guess, yeah, because it's not clear where that scratch comes from. Right. But that scratch becomes a scar that's there for the rest of the movie. Is it? Because I think it's a pair of the men, they zoom in on it in the beginning of quarter two, so that we know that that's Monica. Oh, yes, yes, absolutely. But by the end of the movie, I didn't see it anymore. Like at the end, the last best, the last record game. Either go there or the makeup people forgot to put it back on. I think the makeup people forgot to put it on because I swear at the end of that film, it was not there anymore. So young Quincy is played by Glendon Chapman, and young Monica is played by Kyla Pratt, who I just saw in not another church movie. And I've seen in Dr. Doo Little, the 1998 one. Later, we meet Quincy's parents, Nona and Zeke McCall. Zeke plays pro basketball for the LA Clippers. Nona pretends that she can cook. Quincy is trying to draw an apology in blocked letters and gets frustrated. Can't do this shit. What do I tell you about using that word? Can't, should never be in a man's vocabulary. And why not? Because when you say can't, you ain't a man. Well, oh yeah, don't say shit. Okay, yes, it made me chuckle the whole skipping over the shit for the life lesson thing. And then going back to oh yeah, don't say shit also. Okay, dad joke. All right, fuck that life advice though. Fuck that nugget of wisdom, because that's not wisdom. I say can't all the fucking time. But are you a man? 100 fucking percent. Yes, I am. My fingernails might be blue right now, but I still a fucking man. And I say can't all the time, because real men know when they can't do something. And instead of pretending that they can and fucking it up, we say no, I can't do that. This is not a political movie whatsoever. But that is very much a Republican mindset. Or at least that's the presentation they put across. Because you think about every other campaign, at least for president, I never see for a public, it's always no apologies. You're never wrong. Everything you do is fantastic. Like the thing is, I'm not even sure that's a conservative thing. That is a very particularly United States, toxic leadership thing. And it happens on both sides of the political aisle. Yes, I would agree with that up to a point. I mean, it's pathological on the conservative side, but it's definitely present everywhere. How does the Democrats are writing books saying no apologies? Whereas, I think that would admit Romney's book, but the Democrats just don't apologize. They don't write books about it. They just still don't do it. I don't know. It depends. Anyway, anyway, let's see the here and there. Let's get back to the movie. Nona McCall is played by Debbie Morgan, my childhood crush. And we know Debbie from ease by you. We saw that for the show. And I know her from all my children. That's why I first got my crush on her from. She played Angie on all my children, which I watched vigorously back when I was a young man. She was married to Jesse. And they were the first black super couple. I've discussed them before, so I won't get too much into it. But I love that woman. I thought she was hot. And I had really disgusting thoughts about her as a child. That's all I'll get into. And what else do you know her from George? I'm just happy I got to pull it. I number one got to and number two, I could so quickly pull out my soap opera theme for you. And I know her from She's All That. And Zeke McCall is played by Dennis Haysbert. And for the show, we've seen him in Waiting to Exhale, Jarhead, and Sin City. And I've seen him in Heat and Ted too. And I've seen him in Major League and heard him in Wreck-It Ralph. Who knew he was such a big Dennis Haysbert fans, right? Check out Pearl of Wisdom. We'll come back to bite him later. Zeke heads off to go to a business meeting, while Nona and Quincy take a store-bought cake that Nona will pass off as home-baked, as they welcome to their new neighbors. I did that once. Did you? I bought some from a store, and pretended it was "I baked it!" You dirty rotten stinking liar. I did that that we were... I guess it was a graduation. I did some college thing, and they wanted us to bring it. I mean, you didn't have to, but if you wanted to, you could bring something. And I brought in some something, and like a cake, and I pretended I baked it. So you didn't even have to bring it in the first place, and you still took extra credit for it. I did, because I can be an asshole sometimes. Monica and her mother, Camille Wright- I thought you would not agree with that. I also didn't disagree with that. I let that statement stand on its own. Monica and her mother, Camille Wright, welcome Nona and Quincy into their home. Camille asks a question. So how long have y'all been here? Well, we moved back here when Quincy was about five after Zeke was traded again. And the neighborhood was a little more mixed back then. Well, that was before the Black people down the street became the Black people next door. Okay. Nona goes for an awkward high five with Camille, who is holding that cake with both hands. Camille awkwardly returns a gesture before expositing her dream to one day own a catering business. The adults go toward the house, leaving the kids to stick their fingers in the cake and talk about their dads. Camille Wright is played by Alfrie Woodard, who we both seen in Captain America Civil War and Star Trek First Contact. And I've seen in 12 years of slave, Clemency, the piano lesson TV movie, Crooklyn and Passion Fish. I've heard her in the Lion King and seen her in Scrooge. Later, Monica's hair is being painfully brushed by her older sister, young Lina Wright, as Camille pushes back against Monica's tomboyishness by having her dress more girly. Their father, Nathan Wright, a banker, comes in to ask Camille to iron two shirts for tomorrow because he can't decide on which one he wants and he wants both ready. Fuck you, dude. He's never corrected. He's never that big a part of this movie, but he's never confronted going like, "You could really probably do some of the housework yourself, are they having your poor wife do it?" That includes already in your own goddamn clothing. Young Lina is played by Nakia Harris. Nathan Wright is played by Harry Linux, who we've both seen in Man of Steel. And I've seen in Bad Boys, the Nighting Three version again, not the one with Martin Lawrence and Will Smith. And I've also seen in Batman vs Superman, Dawn of Justice, Shirek, and Clockers. And I've seen in The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions. At night, Zeke and Nona are loudly getting it on, keeping Quincy awake. He looks out his bedroom window and sees Lina brushing Monica's hair. Quick note here. Quick note here because we could stop here for a while and talk about why this mother never looked across, saw a boy's bedroom there and thought, "Oh, I should have curtains on this window that can't be fucking moved. 100% or my movie, my daughter's bedroom somewhere else." Yeah, no one seems to mind this. No one seems to comment on it. And also, they have the whole, I guess we'll get into it, the whole window thing, which is also true. And what was the skateboarding cube, the gleaming cube? Yeah, gleaming the cube. For some reason there's these movies set in California where people go in and out of people's homes, gents anyway, to the window. Is that a comic California thing? I don't know. I always thought it was weird because my family, my mom's side of the family, never used the front door. You used the window? No, there was always like a side door or a back door. And we only ever went to the side or back doors. So, I don't know if that was just a weird "my family" thing, but I think humans just do weird shit sometimes. And maybe in California, they just go in and out of their windows. Fuck, I don't know. It's just like a thing. And I think it isn't, it wasn't Doogie House, they're also set in California. And they also, Doogie's friend would always come by and go through the window. Mm-hmm. I don't know. It's a California, and please write in and let us know. Is that a California thing? Or at least a California of that era where you go in and out of the windows? And then Heathers. Oh, and Heathers, you're right. Yes. And isn't that dangerous? Yes. That easy access might be great for your neighbors, but it's, you know, kind of bad if a burglar finds out about this. It's also dangerous because a lot of these windows are on second floors. Like we invented doors at ground level for a fucking reason. The next day, Monica and Quincy begin to head to school together. The next three minutes of the movie are an entire whole three-act play unto themselves. Quincy suggests that they be a couple and then negotiate terms on what would constitute an apology. Then they kiss for five seconds. It's really cute. Wait, because you're my girl now, you got a ride on my bike. But I'm gonna ride my own bike. My dad always drives my mom. So? So that means I have to ride you. Come on. I don't have to do what you say. Forget you, man. Stupid. It devolves from there into a rolling down the hill fight, and that's how we end the first quarter. Also, yeah, fuck that. He's a little dick there. Did this remind you? Because you had similar thing, didn't you? With, uh, you went off of the school mate and started kissing her? Didn't you tell me this story? You give me a look here. Like, you don't know what I'm talking about. I mean, I've made out for extended periods of time. Yes. We all have. I'm talking about maybe where a little bit of me. It's in heaven. Yeah. We went back behind a Tiamo convenience store and bred by a birch elementary school and went back behind some bushes and made out for a while. So you may? Okay. That's not how you, I remember the story. You told me the story, you were a kid and you will approach each other and the other kids are watching. You're kissing, and you didn't know what you were doing, but you thought it felt really good. Although you were probably doing it wrong. Yeah. No, I'm talking about the same thing. I mean, we basically just laid there with our lips pressed together for seven, playing, quote, seven minutes in heaven. But yeah, it was nice. My first kiss with a little girl. Well, I shouldn't say a little bit. I only, you should rephrase this. You should think very hard about how you're going to frame this right now. And be careful. I think it's a little boy. There'll be nothing wrong with that if I did. Okay. Let's be clear on that. But I did not. I'll recommend you say my first kiss as a child. My first kiss as a child. You didn't give that in. I don't give a shit. My first kiss is a child. I do because I don't want you to go to prison. Oh, I see. Yeah. I'm kissing little kids as a grown man. Come on. Jesus Christ. Anyway, was at PS16. It was in the school closet for some reason. Well, if that symbolism, I don't know. I was literally in the closet, but with a little curl. Well, we're both little kids. All right. And we had a little pick. Okay, then the second quarter is 1998 and starts 12 minutes into the film. Monica Wright is now a senior playing on her high school basketball team. There's a college scout in the stands. The ref takes Monica out of the game on a technical foul and Monica expresses her displeasure about this verbally. Now Monica Wright is played by Santa Lathan. We've seen her for the show in brown sugar and we both seen her in blade. And I've seen her in the best man big 1999 version and contagion life and the wood. I've seen her in alien versus predator. The next morning at breakfast, Monica asks her dad to talk to the coach to keep her in the game because the scouts are in the stands and there's only one game left. Her parents push back effectively going the you should want a real job route. Monica looks out the window and sees Quincy McCall making out with someone at his car. We shift to them and Quincy turns down sex because his parents would kill him because that ever happens. Quincy McCall is played by Omar Epps so I've seen him in the wood. And I've seen in a lot of episodes of house. Now we're at another high school basketball game. This time it's the boys and Quincy is racking up points. Monica is cheering for him in the stands. Another student bothers her into delivering a note to Quincy since they're close and all asking him to the big dance. Which is weird. The girls have to actually do notes. It's always a boy. Yes, the girls do notes. No, I don't think they ever do them like this. Well, that's what I mean. That's got a boy because usually you don't have to girls. You don't have to be nervous about asking a boy out nine times out of ten. He's going to say yes. If he's going to be thrilled that you're asking him. After the game, Quincy's dad tells him he's proud of him but also tries to dissuade him from putting all of his eggs in the basketball basket. Quincy gives Monica a ride home. She reads the note and it's a dance invite with a booty call attached or as she frames it sending her kuchi through the mail. She calls the sender a ho which puts Quincy on the defensive. He reinforces the gender inequality in sports saying that Monica wouldn't get recruited so long as she's acting so unladylike. And I just want to make a quick note here. That's one of the problems with this film. The gender slurs are just all over this film and I don't think they're even conscious of it. That any woman who wants to have sex is upset a whole slut even who wants to want to even sleep it around or go home. Like come on guys. You come on. Mature it up for Christ's sake. A woman who likes to have sex doesn't make her a slut. Makes her a woman a lot of guys like. And suddenly, it's a man a slut. Now guys like sleeping around but some of my reason is like a girl is bad. Come on. This is 1950s bullshit. Don't even go there. Yep. Now adult Lena Wright is once again helping Monica with her hair. What's more, she's got Monica a college man to take her to the dance so that Monica can focus on playing ball in the final game. Lena Wright is played by Regina Ho and this is her junior credit. And I've just saw her in Honk for Jesus Savior's Soul. I've all seen her in The Hate You Give, Support the Girls, and Def and a Funeral. And we definitely need to support the girls on the list. But it hasn't been 10 years yet. So okay then. And I've seen her in Scary Movie. Which was a comedy, right? Yep. So it was a really scary. Yep. So the title was ironic. Yes. I mean, I'm not sure that's ironic. Yeah. If you name something one thing and it's not that thing, it's irony. I mean, that could also just be a lie. Okay. At that game, we go to Monica's eye view and hear her thinking trying to play smart. She still gets called on a reaching foul, allowing the other team to score two points that her team can't come back from. They lose the game and she feels responsible. As she should, she fucked up. Now, Lena preps Monica for the big dance. Camille even lends Monica her grandmother's pearl necklace. And it for one of the few times in Monica's life tells her that she's beautiful. Again, and we cannot stress this enough, she is a beautiful woman. The entire movie. This mother has some fucking 50s blinders on. She has some gender normative issues. Yeah. At the dance, Monica's college date, Jason, is desperately trying to get Monica to enjoy herself. Not even necessarily trying to like get into her skirt or anything. He's just trying like, hey, have some fun. Yeah. No, he's actually seems pretty cool. Quincy keeps leaving his date to talk to Monica and he and Monica make eyes while they're dancing with their dates. I don't know how this woman who's with Quincy doesn't go like, fuck you, I'm going home or go with some other guy. You go and I'm talking to someone else while we're on this date, some of the girl. Like what the fuck? That is so offensive. Jason is played by Morse Cody and this is his freshman role. And we've seen him in brown sugar. Quincy and Monica get back home around the same time, neither having had sex with their dates. They meet in the yard between their bedrooms and talk about that. Then she has him open her letter from USC, telling her that she got in on a basketball scholarship. Turns out, so did Quincy. Happy they kiss. And that kiss becomes Monica's first time having sex. And that closes out the second quarter. That whole scene was weird to me. The whole love scene watching teenagers have sex is weird for you, Joe. Okay. I am on board. No, I mean, we see him putting on a con. We don't see him actually literally, but we get the idea to see him tear open the con, put anything on. But okay, granted, I did not have sex as a teenager. So maybe I have no idea. But it was always my understanding that you need to turn on the oven before you put in the meat. And I don't know what he did to turn around so quickly that he was able to slip that thing on and get it in there. Movie magic, Joe. I mean, are you wetter as a teenager? I don't know. I think maybe. I mean, they were kissing. They were making out. I think and she invited him in like she she invited him in. I think she are her oven was already warm. Perhaps the third quarter is 1998 to 1989 and starts 47 minutes in. This is less than halfway through the movie. And we are in the third quarter. We see Monica in basketball practice with coach Ellie Davis riding her ass. Her team in particular their starting point, Cidra O'Neill, are super competitive. Disgustingly so like how do you have a team where everyone's that nasty to you? Like, I don't know, I would have got to quit. Coach Davis is played by Kristin Dunford and I've seen her in Uli's gold and Cidra O'Neill is played by Erica Rignor and that's her freshman role and I've seen her in King Richard. Between classes, Monica and Quincy make out in the grass. Splendour in the grass, I've seen that movie. At another practice, the coach humiliates Monica for standing in a pose instead of doing her job on defense. In the locker room, Cidra tells her that Monica only made the team because another teammate got pregnant. Which he really couldn't possibly know for a fact. Right. That night in Quincy's dorm room, he's icing her ankle and goading her into keeping playing after the humiliation. Then they play strip basketball. Which seems a bit weird since her ankle is supposed to hurt. I said it but I guess you just forget it's all about it to do this. Yep. Then we get a Monica training montage mixed with a Quincy playing montage. After a game, Zeke and Quincy head out to a bar. Zeke tells Quincy that he'll probably hear some rumors that Zeke has a kid with another woman and that those are damned dirty lies. In the next of Monica's games, Cidra gets injured. Quincy goes home to visit Nona, who shows him photos taken by a private investigator. Of her husband, Quincy's father, cheating on her. Yep. So much for that damn dirty lie. Zeke is a naughty boy. Yep. Later that night, he and Monica are talking about his family drama in the stands and she can't stay any longer because of her teen curfew. Okay. I'm not a big fan of romantic comedies and it's shit like this is why I don't like them. This is the best. This is the whole conflict in their relationship. And every time I see romantic comedy, the reason that people have a conflict is always bullshit. As you do the most minor nonsense that no real couple could possibly break up over. Yeah. Hey Quincy, you're feeling shitty because your parents dynamics and your girlfriend has to go back to her dorm because curfew and you get upset at her and he does get upset at her. Very upset at her. Unreasonably upset at her and he does unreasonable things out of that upset. Yeah. It's a completely ludicrous. There's somebody like him who plays basketball and has had curfew himself. He went 100% understand. Oh, that's right. You have to get ready for the game. I understand we can talk on the phone or something like that. There's no way this character would go like, how dare you not have time for me? Oh, I'm so sensitive. I mean granted his dancing asshole and he's picked up some of that asshole stuff for himself. But so you should have other friends. First of all, that's another thing. Yes. He's like on the team. You should have friends. Yeah. Dude, you are ultimately responsible for your managing your own fucking emotions. You don't have a right to force anybody else to be doing that emotional labor for you. And if she has to go because her dreams are tied up and her not getting kicked off of her fucking basketball team, then self-soothe motherfucker dreams that he himself also has. Right. He should come again. This is not some alien thing to him. Like, I don't understand why you're doing this. He knows why because he himself is in the basketball. So again, it just doesn't, the whole conflict made no sense to me. And that's why, all right, I'm out of this film. But, and here's where it really sucks. That's not unrealistic. Probably not. Guys are assholes. And I've said it before, we are not taught past kindergarten and don't steal and mostly don't hit how to fucking relate to each other. So, I could see it happening. I guess. I can't argue. Quincy's next game shows him off kilter, not playing as well as he usually does. No shit. With Sidra's injury, Coach Davis has Monica's starting point and they win. After the game, coach makes that a permanent position change and assures Monica that her riding her ass was because she saw potential. I'm only hitting you because I love you. That's what I heard there. Yeah, that's another toxic thing in this film. Like, come on. But I'm sure coaches really do that. Oh, yeah, I'm just riding you because I love you and thinking, great, it's why I'm ignoring you. They should be worried. Well, yes, that should also worry. You know, this isn't brought up in the film, but man, the bullshit college student who played sports for the school had to pit up with, whereas the cultures are making boo-coo butts. These coaches are making so much money and the school is making money off these kids, but the kids are making nothing and they treat it like shit. I'm like, what is this nonsense? But that's neither here nor there for this film. It's not even an issue. At a party, Monica sees Quincy talking with other girls. She wants to talk, but he's all handsy and she tells him to stop. He leaves the party in a huff back in his dorm room. He tells his father off and that he's quitting school to go pro. I know you're mad at me, okay? But I cannot let you do this. I always thought Kent wasn't in a man's vocabulary. That was annoying because Zeke clearly said, cannot. Like, he could have said, I can't let you do that and it would have fit perfectly. But no, we have to shoehorn that fucking garbage piece of advice into a sentence where it doesn't fucking belong. Well, Kent, not a Kent mean the same thing. It means the same thing, but it's not the same word. Also, quarters should be evenly spaced. Okay. Anyway, Zeke leaves and Quincy cries. After one of Monica's games, she goes to his dorm to see him because he wasn't there. He said he had a meeting. Then another girl comes over and it's clear that he's taking her on a date. Monica excuses herself and heads back home. And if that girl had any suspect she would have also headed home, she's like, I see that you have something going on with this girl and I'm not sticking around for this. So bye. As Monica gets home, her mom is leaving. Monica is obviously upset and her mother assumes it's because of a lost basketball game. So Monica heads back to school and Quincy is waiting for her. He blames his own cheating behavior on Monica's dedication to basketball and they break up. And that should have been the end of the fucking movie. No, it can't because they belong together because it's a romantic comedy and everyone has to end up together. You see, nobody belongs together. That's not a thing. You obviously have never seen a soap. Everyone belongs together according to soap, opera, logic and romantic comedies. We belong together. We were meant to read. This ends the third quarter. The fourth quarter is 1993 and starts at an hour and 22 minutes in. Monica is playing pro ball in Italy and is something of a celebrity there. Before a game, their coach basically tells the team to give her the ball. Turns out they're playing against the team with Cidra on it. They're both starting point and ultimately Monica's team wins. There is no way Monica wouldn't know the Cidra was on that team. Right? Monica and Cidra go out to dinner. Cidra talks about how Italian guys are into black women. I can't speak to that at all. I have no fucking idea if that's true or not. I've heard that. I'm not a black woman, so I don't know what's true. Do you think you're having problems finding a black woman because Italian stuck them all? Yeah, it could be. All right, we have a working hypothesis. The Tony Sopranos of the world have stolen my wedding. Monica hasn't made any friends around there. Afterwards, she sits in her room watching family matters lonely. Is that what she was watching? Yeah. No, I didn't know. In a bar, Zeke is watching a Lakers game and Quincy is a substitute. He gets to play. He scores a basket, but falls and tears he's Achilles tendon. So Zeke goes to visit him in the hospital and it doesn't go super great for either of them. The next day, Monica comes to visit. They spend a moment catching up before Quincy's fiance, Kyla Kessler comes in, dashing Monica's hopes for a rekindling to the ground. Another place this movie could have fucking ended. Also, I'm a little bothered by the fact that Tyra Banks has such a bit part in this. That too. But Quincy gets to have all these different relationships, but apparently Monica does not. Nobody wants Monica. This gorgeous black woman. This is incredibly hot woman. And for some reason, guys are not hitting on her left and right, but but but but but and this is important just because guys are hitting on her doesn't mean she wants any of them. True, but does she really want the one guy? No other man, she finds attractive? Well, apparently so, Joe. And why is that? Because they were meant to be together? No, Joe, because the script says so because the script says. Anyway, Tyra Kessler is played by Tyra Banks and I seen her in Tropic Thunder. Inexplicably. Inexplicably? I've seen her technically. No, this is inexplicable. Tyra Banks plays this bit part in this fucking movie. I mean, okay, it's a favor of a successful black woman to a another black woman. I'll call it that. Perhaps. And what credits have you seen of her? Coyote Ugly. Monica goes back home and has a tearful argument with her mother about how her mother never started that catering business and how she only ever came to two Amontica's games. She goes into her room and takes down all the basketball posters, plaques, and trophies. It's so weird that she's met at her mother because we literally only see her mother at these games. The games we see her play, her mother's there. No. Oh, the ones where we she can attend. I mean, when she goes off the cause, not, but the games and local. No, I remember being at no, her sister was there, but not her. Oh, and her dad were there. Oh, oh, wow. I got that wrong. Cause I remember his mother being there. That's cause all black women look the same to you, Joe. It's true. Like re-sanding that horrible. My mother, my grandmother, my sister all look alike to me. Although they're over there. Well, they're really what makes sense. Yeah. So that makes sense, actually. The only thing she doesn't do is cut her hair. She goes into her room and tears down all the basketball stuff. She just doesn't go into the bathroom and then cut her hair. Is that important to you? Are you referencing something that I'm like? I'm referencing every other movie where a woman goes through some kind of big change in their life. They go into the bathroom and cut their fucking hair. We get another montage combining Monica starting out at a boring, normy job and Quincy in physical therapy. In the evening, Monica spends time with her mother and Lena and Lena's new baby. When Lena goes to change the baby, Camille casually tells Monica that she's always admired the fight in her and that Quincy could do better than Kira by choosing Monica. And then she walks away and she drops that thing that her daughter needed to hear from her for her entire fucking life. Quick, just drops that and walks away. I, it's so weird because I guess the parents must know that kids were dating, but it's never their responses aren't like, "Oh, while kids are dating and they broke up." I don't know. It just, that part of it always just seems a little weird to me and shaky, but oh, she should be with you and not him. How would you know that? Oh, you need to determine who this boy should be with? What the hell? What the hell is that? "Maker, match, maker, make me a match." It's two weeks before the wedding and Monica can't sleep. She wakes Quincy up and ultimately challenges him to a one-on-one match. If she wins, he calls off the wedding and marries her. Because to play for what George is... Oh, we'll get there. That's the end clip, I think. If she loses, she buys a wedding present. I just want to point out the inequity in this bet. Her logic is that if she wins, it's because Quincy wants her to. And not because he's a torn Achilles tendon. She starts off strong, but Quincy makes a comeback and ultimately wins. Then he flips the script and challenges best two out of three, meaning he did want her to win after all. They get married, have a baby, and Monica plays in the WNBA for the LA Sparks. The end. Ah, I laughed so hard. I don't remember if I did originally, but I definitely did when I saw it again. She goes like, "We're gonna play for your heart." Like, "What the fuck?" First of all, if I'm about to marry someone, presumably I'm committed to that person. So then this woman come over and be like, "Hey, break up with her and be with me." I would be like, "Well, he even says it. What before my wedding? Are you giving me this?" I would tell her, "You need to go home and reset your priorities. And I'm moving on with my life. You move on with yours." Yeah, because if he can be... And look, you... Nobody is ever stolen. Right? People leave people. If Kit were to leave me, even if she's dating somebody else, she didn't leave me for them. She left me because our relationship wasn't working for her. But, Monica, if you can, with a basketball game, convince Quincy to leave Kira, what the fuck makes you think that he can't be convinced to leave you? Yeah, well, that's a good point. Also, the whole life, I've been in love with you since I was 11. Do you have that change that you were 11 years old? You know what everybody... Also, you beat the shit out of each other in the grass when you were a live. Hey, remind me of the line and stand by me where he says, "Oh, I only remember your friends when you were a little kid." I'm like, "What side of maturity are people going to feel when I stuck when they were like 11?" I'm not the same person I was at 11. I would not be in love with someone I was in love with when I was 11. I mean, yet, the two people... I married two people I went to high school with. I think high school is different than before puberty, fair. I mean, 11 is really freaking young. True. And I say, "Oh, I've been loving you since I was 11. I've been fighting for you all this time." Wow. I... That's... I mean, that's a desperate and unhealthy and an instant turnoff. 100%. It's like, you have not matured in that time. You haven't thought about other people in that time. You have that dated of the people in that time. Really just waiting for me? Ah, that's not a compliment. That's like telling me there's something wrong with you. You made some person up in your mind rather than grown on and had a life. I mean, this one's been to college. She's lived overseas. She should have had... And we only know her had this one with this dude, and she's pining after bullshit. Anyway, God, it doesn't still work. Yeah. It's a stupid, romantic comedy based on basketball. It's fine. Like, it's stupid for all the reasons. It's got all the bad relationship dynamics that I expect in a fucking romantic comedy. It's... It's... People love this movie. People do love this movie. Unfortunately, or fortunately, I'm not one of them. I... It didn't work. Oh, I didn't like it either. But at first... I don't think it does. I think the emotions are dated. And granted, yes, I still do shit like this. So maybe, maybe I'm wrong on this. And also, I didn't believe the characters. I didn't find the dialogue particularly convincing. The way they talk doesn't sound to me. Like, people of that particular class would be talking. It sounded like they were trying to pin it. Hey, it sounded like you're really black people. Some of them are an actor that just didn't... It felt forced to me. Yeah, I don't know. It just did not work for me. I did not care for this movie whatsoever. I didn't believe their relationship. And again, I also just don't like romantic comedies. I mean, the last romantic movie I liked, I guess, was Officer and a gentleman. But I feel like those characters grew. And these characters, I think, are pretty much the same. I mean, does he really grow? Does he learn any less than the entire time? No, nobody in his... I don't think it makes it not work because... But I think you're right. They don't grow. I mean, she grows slightly and then she gets a normy job and that's different. So that's growth. But... And I guess he does grow. He grows to be a husband and a father to somebody who is pursuing the dream that he wanted and he doesn't seem crushed by it, which that's actually a kind of envy that a lot of guys have when their wives are more successful than them. They don't really explore it in the film. I suspect if there was a part two, that would be there. Maybe. But anyway, you're right. I guess he grows. But it's not unbelievable from the very beginning. I mean, the growth is in the last minute of the movie. But also, well, no. I mean, it isn't really good because at the beginning of the film, he wants to be like his dad. His dad's a marinade's kids. I can see him also want to be marinade kids. So I don't know. I guess we just... No, you're just... You think the basics are still there and it still makes it work? I think the basics are still there, but I don't think it works. So... That's fair. Split decision, but we both saw the same movie. We just... Different fields up and up. Oh, it's almost like what a few different people and that's what makes this podcast work. All right, George, what's up next? Well, our next episode is a Patreon choice episode and we don't know what the movie is going to be because our patrons vote on those and that vote hasn't been finalized yet. If you want to vote, but are not a patron, you can give me a wedding present and fix that by becoming one at patreon.com/dtswpod. Wow, we really should have played the whole wedding thing. Use that as a... Hey, right? It's in lieu of gifts. Join our podcast. It'll be a great gift to George. Yep. Do you give me a present? Tell 10 people about this podcast. Yes, please. Tell somebody about this podcast. We're drowning over here. By the way, if you ever meet me, ladies and gentlemen, let me know if you think I sound short or tall because I... I couldn't be... Marsh, again, from Scups of the K, and he has the voice of a small man, but he has a big body. I was very surprised. Not a bit. He's tall. He is a very tall man. He's tall to me, and he is tall. He's tall. He is very tall. I described as my friend that I have to stand on my tiptoes to hug. But then, Mac, he has the voice of a tall person. Yeah. But the marsh does not. Marsh sounds short. And he really loves... Keith loves that his primary descriptive characteristic is that he's tall. He just wants that a lot. We can also talk about his hair. He's bold, so... So we can't talk about it. It's not there to defend itself. No. So I guess for this episode, I'm Joe Dixle. Thanks for listening. And I'm George Romaka. Thanks for listening, indeed, because if a podcast drops and there's nobody around to hear it, it's just another collection of ones and zeros. Doesn't matter. I'll play you. What? One game, one-on-one. For what? Your heart. I'll rip it out of your... Worst life ever. You've been listening to "Does This Still Work?" produced by Joe Dixon and George Romaka. The hosts can be reached via social media, email, or the contact page at dtswpod.com. Be good to yourself and others, because that still works. Which begs the question. What the hell happened to, uh... Sorry. Which begs the question. What happened to, uh... Okay. What's the whoopee-goop bug movie? The purple, not rain. The color purple. Jesus Christ. Let me do that again. Dear Anne Landers. My partner and I have been together one and a half years. Dear Spakey Bee. Do we want to talk about the wedding at all, since we're all here, and we were all there, and it's the first episode after we're married?
