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The Rewatchables ·

Clueless

year 1995decade 90sdirector Amy Heckerlinggenre Drama
host Juliet Litmanhost Amanda Dobbinshost K. Austin Collins
All 9 categories

Most Rewatchable Scene · 10:03

Dionne on the freeway

Dionne on the freeway is one pick, with the clip played: a cascade of ludicrous disasters including the biker gang, the old lady flipping the bird, the truck and the screaming, and it is what eventually leads Dionne to lose her virginity according to Cher; preceded by finding out Christian is gay, it is called a perfect, frenetic five minutes of pure comedy.

The freeway scene is infinitely referenceable for anyone who moved to Los Angeles late in their driving career; the hosts think it was filmed in Long Beach, probably the 405, because of a Long Beach sign in the back, and say the film takes on a whole new look once you live in LA; one navigated by Clueless for six months and mistook the Beverly Center for the Westside Pavilion where Ty had her near-death experience.

The Neil McCauley “A Book about Metals” Award for Best Line from the Movie · 36:23

"If I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him?"

Nominations open with Cher's 'if I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him', called an eternal truth and eternal question; 'she could be a farmer in those clothes' has many uses; and 'let's do a lap before we commit to a location' is excellent party advice.

The film

Clueless (1995)

Directed by Amy Heckerling · Drama

97 minutes

IMDbLetterboxdJustWatch
Cast

Selected cast credits · Film reference

Alicia Silverstone Cher Horowitz
Paul Rudd Josh Lucas
Stacey Dash Dionne Davenport
Brittany Murphy Tai Frasier
Dan Hedaya Melvin "Mel" Horowitz
Jeremy Sisto Elton Tiscia
Breckin Meyer Travis Birkenstock
Justin Walker Christian Stovitz
Wallace Shawn Mr. Wendell Hall
Twink Caplan Miss Toby Geist
Julie Brown Coach Millie Stoeger
Donald Faison Murray Duvall
Elisa Donovan Amber Mariens
Sabastian Rashidi Paroudasm Banafshein
Herb Hall Principal
Susan Mohun Heather
Nicole Bilderback Summer Han
Ron Orbach DMV tester
Sean Holland Lawrence
Roger Kabler college guy
Josh Lozoff Logan

Everything from the episode

In the order the hosts got to it. Open a row for the discussion.

3:15

Casting What-Ifs

Reese Witherspoon and Sarah Michelle Gellar were up for Cher; Paul Rudd reportedly wanted Christian or Murray; Jeremy...

Reese Witherspoon and Sarah Michelle Gellar were up for Cher; Paul Rudd reportedly wanted Christian or Murray; Jeremy Renner was up for Christian and, the host thinks, turned it down; Terrence Howard for Murray; Lauryn Hill for Dion; Owen Wilson tried out for Travis; Leah Remini auditioned for Ty; Zooey Deschanel was up for Amber and Cher

In the discussion (6)
Approx. transcript time · 00:03:15Read transcript
  • The casting names are called almost more fun than Titanic's, which the same three hosts covered two weeks earlier, because people did not want to own up to passing on Titanic; Reese Witherspoon and Sarah Michelle Gellar were both up for Cher, the Gellar name recalled through Cruel Intentions.
  • A tangent: Cruel Intentions came a couple of years later, Clueless is a G rated movie by comparison, and one host cannot believe their parents let them watch Cruel Intentions all the time.
  • Paul Rudd, who played Josh, apparently wanted to be Christian or Murray; the hosts could see him as Christian but are glad he did not do it, and one was deep in Paul Rudd fandom in the nineties through the show Sisters, where he was Swoozie Kurtz's son-in-law married to Ashley Judd's character (names as transcribed).
  • Clueless and Paris in Romeo and Juliet are called the peak Paul Rudd run for one host, who says he never gets enough credit for sustained relevance but will never matter more than he did then.
  • The best what-if is Jeremy Renner being up for Christian, which the host thinks he turned down; the hosts can see it and wonder whether his career would have looked different, joking about his status in the Marvel movies.
  • More names in the mix: Terrence Howard for Murray, Lauryn Hill for Dion (she was acting then, as in Sister Act), Owen Wilson trying out for Travis, Leah Remini auditioning for Ty, and Zooey Deschanel up for both Amber and Cher; a Deschanel Cher is agreed to be a very different and worse movie.
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10:03

Most Rewatchable Scene

Dionne on the freeway; Cher's debate speech; Cher's arrest

Dionne on the freeway; Cher's debate speech; Cher's arrest

In the discussion (10)
Approx. transcript time · 00:10:03Read transcript
  • Dionne on the freeway is one pick, with the clip played: a cascade of ludicrous disasters including the biker gang, the old lady flipping the bird, the truck and the screaming, and it is what eventually leads Dionne to lose her virginity according to Cher; preceded by finding out Christian is gay, it is called a perfect, frenetic five minutes of pure comedy.
  • The freeway scene is infinitely referenceable for anyone who moved to Los Angeles late in their driving career; the hosts think it was filmed in Long Beach, probably the 405, because of a Long Beach sign in the back, and say the film takes on a whole new look once you live in LA; one navigated by Clueless for six months and mistook the Beverly Center for the Westside Pavilion where Ty had her near-death experience.
  • The debate speech about the Haitians, with the RSVP and Statue of Liberty line, is the pick. — Amanda Dobbins
  • The clip of the Haitians speech is played; the line about the Statue of Liberty is called politically true even though Cher is not aware of it, and she is smarter than she knows; the shot of her drawing out her gum after the last line is the one frame that describes Cher, and should have been her Oscar reel, since comedic performances are not honored enough and this is a defining performance of the decade.
  • A runner-up: the first ten minutes are among the best openings the host can think of, because the voiceover narration, usually a sign a film is being patched together, instead puts you in Cher's world with ten iconic lines in five minutes and the touch-screen fashion computer program, which was forward thinking even if the monitor looks like trash now and the hanger screensaver is perfect.
  • The yellow plaid outfit and Cher's cami-and-shorts pajamas are iconic, and the film gets too little credit for nailing walking and talking, less noticeable and weird than anything by Aaron Sorkin; Cher's default is walking and talking, taking a lap before committing to a location at school and in Contempo Casual at the mall.
  • A favorite small moment is Cher continuing to walk in the yellow plaid outfit while Dion and Murray have their weave argument and high school boys try to enter her space; she pushes them out of the way, a living diorama, and an excellent first-person piece of media, which is hard to do.
  • A third host has several nominations: the Val party, multifaceted and capped off by the head-shaving in the bathroom ('Dion shaving his head' as transcribed), with the 'keeping it real' clip; Ty's makeover, the ER montage, which loses points because nobody's hair dye comes out that easily, something the film taught the hosts that turned out not to be true.
  • The same host's favorite is Cher's arrest, with the exchange about her designer dress ('an Aliyah' as transcribed) and the robber's threat to shoot her, which has always resonated as really funny, plus the payphone, which the host used a lot as a kid; another thinks Cher is enough of a germaphobe not to touch a payphone, but she was desperate in Sun Valley, which is a lot further than the regular valley.
  • The lead-up has Cher's dad say you can get anywhere in LA in twenty minutes; one host defends it, since Silver Lake to the beach is thirty minutes before 11 a.m. on a Saturday, while another was late to everything for a year because everywhere actually takes forty-five minutes, like New York where a mile walk falls apart when the subway breaks down; the hosts agree the line means Beverly Hills destinations, not Venice, in 1995.
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17:57

What’s Aged the Best?

Cher's plaid outfit and most of her wardrobe; the craft and Amy Heckerling's direction; the affectionate satire; the ...

Cher's plaid outfit and most of her wardrobe; the craft and Amy Heckerling's direction; the affectionate satire; the jokes; Cher's kitchen; the upper-crust design aesthetics; the short skirts

In the discussion (8)
Approx. transcript time · 00:17:57Read transcript
  • The plaid outfit still rocks and most of Cher's outfits are good, with her style coming back; one host wants to say the script but concedes certain aspects of it have not aged well, and lands on craft: the film was impeccably made, still really funny, with most jokes holding up despite being a specific nineties movie.
  • The film does not seem dated, has no fat and no scene to cut, so Amy Heckerling is what has held up best; she was ahead of her time because few satires manage to be so affectionate toward what they satirize, enjoying the silly characters even while mocking them, as with Ty's line that they speak like adults.
  • Cher's kitchen still reads as high-end: a Viking range and oven, the granite countertops seen on every HGTV show, great light, a good double-door refrigerator-freezer, and a startling quantity of cold cuts; only the cabinet handles would need updating.
  • A hand is raised to ask whether anyone noticed how the sandwich is made in the kitchen scene. — Amanda Dobbins
  • The sandwich scene is walked through: just after the makeover, Josh and Cher argue in the kitchen over whether her project has the right intentions while Paul Rudd gets out cold cuts, bread and mayonnaise, puts cold cuts on one slice, dips the knife for a paltry amount of mayo and spreads it directly on the turkey; the hosts are disgusted and wonder whether he was too busy acting to make a sandwich.
  • The sandwich has not enough mayo to moisten anything, no other condiments, no cheese and about one piece of turkey, a gross dry sandwich that horrified the hosts; even so Paul Rudd is a revelation and very funny in the film.
  • The design aesthetics hold up because the world is so upper crust that it is classic rather than trendy, unlike 90210 where the couches and styles look ridiculous; the real-life Los Angeles counterparts might lack taste, but Amy Heckerling's set and costume designers had it, and it clearly mattered that the film be nice to look at.
  • The skirts are really short without being slutty or trashy, which is hard to do, though perhaps the hosts are simply used to the look; the tiny white Calvin Klein dress is recalled with the clip of Cher's dad telling her it looks like underwear, and the hosts note she is only going on a date with the gay guy anyway.
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24:53

What’s Aged the Worst?

The Christian storyline, though the hosts move it toward aged pretty well; Christian's over-stylized retro persona; h...

The Christian storyline, though the hosts move it toward aged pretty well; Christian's over-stylized retro persona; how the teenagers interact, such as Elton keeping Cher's photo in his locker; Murray and Elton sharing a popular crew; Cher and Ty doing a home workout video; the fashion computer's monitor

In the discussion (9)
Approx. transcript time · 00:24:53Read transcript
  • Cher's date with Christian is called the most problematic part of a problematic fave; asked whether falling for a gay man is a rom-com trope, the hosts can only think of the Rupert Everett and Madonna film and agree it is not really a rom-com thing, while finding it funny that the straight guys, Paul Rudd seeing Christian dance with a man and Murray, pick up on it before the ostensibly perceptive Cher and Dion.
  • Murray's reveal, played as a clip, uses 'friend of Dorothy', an old-school gay self-identifying marker from The Wizard of Oz, plus 'cake boy' and the Oscar Wilde, disco-dancing, Streisand-ticket-holding string; the hosts find it hilarious in a good way that Amy Heckerling put those words in Murray's mouth, call the Streisand line remarkable and Pulitzer-worthy, and the 'cake boy' line unfortunate.
  • Christian's analog in Emma, read from Wikipedia in a way Cher would endorse since she loves Cliff's Notes, is Frank Churchill, who courts Emma while secretly engaged to someone else and waiting on an aunt's inheritance, so the storylines are not really the same; the host prefers him being gay to that.
  • GLAAD ('Glad' as transcribed) gave Amy Heckerling an award for the storyline, which was very progressive at the time; Murray pointing out that Christian is gay is not malicious, the joke is that Cher is totally clueless, which one host says has happened to teenage girls and, going by the friends that host still counsels through it, women of all ages, so the item is moved to somewhere between aged best and aged pretty well.
  • What still annoys is Christian's style: the over-stylized guy obsessed with the twenties and thirties, who deserves Cher not knowing who Billie Holiday is, though Billie Holiday deserves better.
  • Discussing a possible remake, the hosts find the way these kids interact foreign to teenagers now; Elton keeping a photo Cher took in his locker is quaint, silly and confusing, which is part of why Elton gets kicked out of the picture because he sucks, and the 'social director of the crew' line is loved.
  • Murray and Elton being in the same crew of popular guys confuses one host, whose high school popular set was uniform in style rather than race; another went to a weird school with a wide range, and a third had a clearly defined cool tier with pressure to look the same, so the kids with sagging jeans and the Eltons would have mutually rejected each other.
  • Cher and Ty doing a home workout video instead of a class has aged badly, though it is set in the nineties when everyone had workout videos; the hosts recall sneaking a mother's 'Tybo' tape (as transcribed), a Paula Abdul video with a routine still remembered, and the Barbie workout video starring Jennifer Love Hewitt.
  • Earlier, during the opening-minutes discussion, the fashion computer's actual monitor is said to look like trash now and not to have aged well, even though the idea was forward thinking.
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32:08

The Dion Waiters Award for Best Heat Check Performance

Donald Faison

Donald Faison

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:32:08Read transcript
  • Donald Faison is named first ('I think it's Donald Faison') and a second participant says that would be their choice too; no third pick is voiced.
  • Faison is annoying and not that good an actor yet integral to the film, so much so that he ended up carrying the TV spin-off, which the host does not think he deserved; the hosts agree the show was so bad they make a pact not to discuss it further.
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32:40

The Vivian Award for Best Clothes

The gym class outfit; the red velour dress Amber copies; the blue Oxford shirt with brown sweater vest and headband; ...

The gym class outfit; the red velour dress Amber copies; the blue Oxford shirt with brown sweater vest and headband; the cardigan and t-shirt at dinner before the Val party; the leather skirt with white blouse when her report card arrives; the yellow plaid is disqualified as iconic

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 00:32:40Read transcript
  • The question is called the toughest of the pod; the yellow plaid is disqualified as iconic, and the gym class outfit is a pick, the skinny tank over a t-shirt that many people, the host included, tried at junior high dances without the same effect.
  • Further nominations: the red velour dress that Amber then copies ('rips off'), with the 'fashion victim or ensemble challenged' and 'Hey, Ambular' lines; the blue Oxford shirt with a brown sweater vest and headband; the cardigan and t-shirt at dinner with her dad and Ty before the Val party, where Cher's dinner line about breaking in her purple clogs prompts the question of whether the audience ever gets to see them, which the hosts would like to; a host notes they would like that advice in 2017.
  • One host's ultimate choice is the short leather skirt with white blouse Cher wears when her report card first comes in and she brings food to her dad; she looks incredible, few could wear a leather skirt casually, and the host bought one after the film without success; the hosts wonder if everything people copied from the film looked worse on them.
  • Knee socks and the one-inch headband were real trends, the headband crucial to the red outfit; Cher wears many headbands and looks great in them, a waspy look that is funny because Cher Horowitz is supposed to be Jewish.
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34:56

Apex Mountain

Paul Rudd (asked 'other than' Silverstone and Heckerling)

Paul Rudd (asked 'other than' Silverstone and Heckerling)

In the discussion (4)
Approx. transcript time · 00:34:56Read transcript
  • The question is posed as who is at their best other than Alicia Silverstone and Amy Heckerling ('Hackerling' as transcribed); one host repeats that Paul Rudd is at his best here, and another jokes that his eyes are at their best in the film.
  • On a seventy-first viewing in HD one host finally noticed how much eyeliner Paul Rudd wears throughout, wondering if it is an emo move or part of his green-party, standing-in-front-of-the-fridge flannel persona; another doubts you are meant to see it and says this was the first film watched on a fancy TV, which revealed things about the aesthetic better left unseen.
  • The pick refers back to an earlier aside during the casting discussion: Clueless together with Paris in Romeo and Juliet is still the peak Paul Rudd run for one host, who says he will never be more important than he was then in that host's universe.
  • A tangent on the Arclight theater chain in Los Angeles, whose lobby displays film costumes that look like sewn-together tablecloths; cameras and lights do a lot of work, HD has ruined many illusions and is good only for reality TV, Game of Thrones production value and sports.
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36:23

The Neil McCauley “A Book about Metals” Award for Best Line from the Movie

"If I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him?"; "She could be a farmer in those clothes"; "let's do a lap...

"If I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him?"; "She could be a farmer in those clothes"; "let's do a lap before we commit to a location"; "street slang is an increasingly valid form of expression"; "Virgin Who Can't Drive"; "that was way harsh, Ty"; "everywhere in L.A. takes 20 minutes"; "I totally paused"; "Want to practice parking? What's the point? Everywhere you go has valet."; "As if"

In the discussion (5)
Approx. transcript time · 00:36:23Read transcript
  • Nominations open with Cher's 'if I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him', called an eternal truth and eternal question; 'she could be a farmer in those clothes' has many uses; and 'let's do a lap before we commit to a location' is excellent party advice.
  • Murray's long speech to Dion, played as a clip, is nominated for using the word misogynistic in 1995 so it rolls off his tongue; unlike Dawson's Creek, where characters seem to have memorized a thesaurus, Murray is proud of a prepared statement he delivered well, and Dion offers no comeback.
  • The 'virgin who can't drive' and 'that was way harsh, Ty' couplet is called maybe the most important exchange in the film; also listed are 'everywhere in L.A. takes 20 minutes', 'I totally paused', and Josh asking if they want to practice parking, answered that everywhere has valet, which one host finds true given a fixation with valet in Los Angeles.
  • The aphorisms are the truest and coolest in the film, and filling it with clever, eternally true lines is very Jane Austen; Amy Heckerling ('Hickling' as transcribed) modernized not just Austen's ideas but her way of having people describe their world, and the first-person approach makes it a perfect adaptation that stays true to the spirit while doing what it wants.
  • During the winner discussion a host realizes 'as if' was forgotten, calls it the best line and almost criminal to omit, and adds 'whatever' with the W hands, which the hosts did a lot.
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39:59

Who Won the Movie?

Alicia Silverstone

Alicia Silverstone

In the discussion (2)
Approx. transcript time · 00:39:59Read transcript
  • Asked who won the movie, with a joke about Paul Rudd's eyes, the host says it is obviously Alicia Silverstone and wonders why they even asked; she is perfect, the ideal avatar for everything Amy Heckerling wanted to get across, and someone wound her up and she nailed it.
  • Much of what is memorable about the movie, even saying 'as if', would not be as memorable without the way she delivers it; the realization that 'as if' was left off the quote list is called almost criminal, 'whatever' with the W hands is added, and the hosts highly recommend rewatching the film.
Podcast choices
Speaker not identified
Alicia Silverstone
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More from the conversation

Asked how many times she has seen the film, she estimates at least fifty, probably more, because it was a teenage rewatchable and she was proud of being able to perform large parts of it.
Approx. transcript time · 00:00:34Read transcript
Asked the same question, he says around fifty too and that it is the movie he has seen more than any other.
Approx. transcript time · 00:01:06Read transcript
Release facts recited: the film came out in July 1995 on a weekend that was not then a blockbuster slot, July 21 to 23, opened to $10.6 million and went on to 55.6, with a Box Office Mojo figure cited around $105 million; a teen or female-driven comedy without poop jokes making that money is hard to imagine now.
Approx. transcript time · 00:01:06Read transcript
One host saw it with their mother in Atlanta, Georgia; the hosts frame it as a teen comedy that also works as satire and as an adaptation of Emma, which set off the teen take on Shakespeare and Jane Austen, and succeeded because it spoke to teenagers and the adults who went with them; 10 Things I Hate About You is smart but less satirical, and She's the Man is Twelfth Night.
Approx. transcript time · 00:01:41Read transcript
Alicia Silverstone is pitch-perfect, one of the hosts' favorite comedic performances and famously not always intentionally comedic: she did not know how to pronounce Haitian, Amy Heckerling told the set not to tell her, and that became the take; Hollywood did not serve her well afterward, and her performance is ranked with Reese Witherspoon's in Legally Blonde among the top leading comedic turns of the nineties and early aughts.
Approx. transcript time · 00:06:31Read transcript
As narrator she puts you inside a Los Angeles snow globe seen only as Cher sees it, with a voice that is not how Silverstone actually talks, credited to Amy Heckerling's direction; the film became an instant classic partly because her subsequent work was not good, with Batman and Robin horrific, though one host rides or dies for Blast from the Past and two were in theaters repping Batman and Robin; a host resents that film for speeding George Clooney's exit from ER.
Approx. transcript time · 00:07:22Read transcript
Research on the high school's name: per a quoted interview, Bronson Alcott High School combines Bronson Pinchot of Perfect Strangers, whom Amy Heckerling was dating, with Bronson Alcott, the father in Little Women and a free thinker into educating women; Pinchot reportedly could not handle her success and they broke up, which the hosts call a very Cher story.
Approx. transcript time · 00:08:42Read transcript
The film is so thoroughly mined that few facts truly surprise anyone, everyone has a fun fact, and the often-told story of Silverstone allegedly being anorexic on set has been thoroughly discussed, yet there is still so much meaning to pick through.
Approx. transcript time · 00:09:32Read transcript
Asked who has had the best career of anyone in the film, the hosts note many flameouts, say it probably would have been Brittany Murphy, may she rest in peace, and agree Paul Rudd is the answer; Jeremy Sisto is maybe number two, now on Law & Order after Six Feet Under and the Dawson's Creek finale, and Donald Faison was in the hugely popular Scrubs and married Jessica Simpson's best friend ('Casey Cobb' as transcribed).
Approx. transcript time · 00:30:52Read transcript
It is not a Can't Hardly Wait situation where everyone became famous; the two most talented people involved, Amy Heckerling and Alicia Silverstone, did not get their due, though it is never too late; one host often sees Silverstone at the farmer's market and still idolizes her for this film alone.
Approx. transcript time · 00:31:50Read transcript
One big question before the winner: is it gross that Cher and Josh end up together? One host only learned from the iTunes description that Cher is fifteen, which changes things the way every rewatched teen movie does, like Pretty in Pink or Sixteen Candles ('16 Camels' as transcribed); another notes she turns sixteen after failing the driving test, and the 'all by myself' realization that she loves Josh is called an amazing moment.
Approx. transcript time · 00:38:55Read transcript
The age dynamics are suspended because it is a movie; the stepbrother objection is waved off since Josh is not legally her stepbrother, they did not grow up together, share no genetics and the parents are no longer married.
Approx. transcript time · 00:39:44Read transcript
Sign-off: the hosts recommend rewatching, point to the Titanic episode two weeks earlier and Speed the week before, and plug a live show in LA on October 18 at Largo.
Approx. transcript time · 00:40:31Read transcript