S4E2.5: Spice World
In the late 90s, close to half of british state intelligence apparatus and nearly 60% of the GDP was involved in some manner in maintaining a phenomenon known as 'cool Britannia'.
The Spice Girls were a girl band formed from open auditions with the aim of creating a group capable of cutting across every demographic in britain, creating a cultural juggernaut that could rival the Britpop boybands of the day.
At the height of their success, their manager's brother wrote a film about them, with them playing themselves. This is that film.
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FREE PALESTINE
Hey, Devon here. For the past few months I've been talking to a family trapped in Gaza, working to cover their daily living costs amidst repeated displacements in the Genocide. Their names are Ahmed and Layla, and their 4 kids are Jana, Malik, Lana and Amir. Anything you can contribute would mean the world to me. They deserve to live.
https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/MajedAqi
https://www.map.org.uk/donate/donate
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Comments (85)
I'm in a taxi in tears at "What's going oOoOn?" 😂
I figured out with like 25 that Rescue Remedy here is basically just 90% alcohol 🥲 no wonder it helped my panic attacks as a teenager...
The two Americans trying to pitch a spice girls film throughout the movie go unnamed by the trio but are played by Mark McKinney (actually Canadian, known for Kids in the Hall, Superstore and Slings & Arrows, if you’re a big Canadian Theatre nerd) and George Wendt (Norm from Cheers). I gotta say I was not expecting those roles to also be played by people I recognized.
(Late, but I've been thinking about this for two months) I'm kind of surprised there was no discussion of the Riot Grrl feminist/music movement and how the aesthetics of the Spice Girls deliberately aped them while stripping away the political elements. Spice Girls (and Girl Power as a broader phenomenon) was purposefully created to be a non-threatening status-quo appropriation of feminist aesthetics, and as Abi noticed, this antifeminism is fairly obvious on its face. Riot Grrl isn't without flaws, and its politics are deeply second-wave (and as such often bioessentialist), but even so, using its aesthetics in service of more conservative politics is troubling.
At one point Abi (or all of them?) assert all the Spice girls are straight but that’s untrue bc Mel B has been in multiple relationships/is engaged with a lady
I think one of them said Mel was gay at the beginning
I actually disagree with the statement that movies with only men are anti-feminist: The Thing(1982), I would argue, has a... if not feminist critique on masculine machismo culture, a very homosociality/gay/gender focused reading (the blood test, the fear of the "infiltrator" who is predatory and it's unclear if they just want to survive or if they have predatory desires towards the humans' bodies, the idea of being something not a Man sleeping and unaware within a man's body until you are awakened to it and forced to hide what you are for fear of the others).
There is also a Homosexual reading of The Thing(1982) where the aliens are AIDS, which was discovered just 1 year earlier. The isolation of Antarctica are the feeling of of abandonment by the govt, the aliens slowly killing off your friends, The obvious blood test analogy, the paranoia of living in an epidemic without knowing enough the disease of how it's transmitted.
Loved this episode I think it's one of the KJB greats. Got some deep Sehnsucht for the 90s now. Although as I watched the doc on Loaded last week (thoroughly recommend) so I'm also now feeling deep anger towards the 90s too. Not only did we not realise how good we had it, we also sowed the seeds of our own destruction.
I feel anger towards the 90s as well. Like, it wasn't good for anyone not in the Capitalist "first world," see Kosovo, Rwanda, the former Soviet Union, et al, but also just... like just good enough to make a bunch of people diehard neoliberals and nothing more.
Did we purposely skip over Gary Glitter's deleted cameo, or was that an oversight?
I have to admit I wouldn't have expected Abigail - fan of Totally Spies! Abigail - to be the one who disliked this movie, or at least had significant enough problems with it that it impacted her enjoyment in a way it didn't for November and Devon. I have to say I don't really agree with her critique but I can see the logic there. Also I totally get November's vibe about wishing she'd seen this back in the day. I was 15 when this came out and since I was very much closeted about my gender identity (still am to be honest outside close friends) I never dared to see it in cinemas, only on video.
I can, I totally get Abi's reaction. That's the kind of thing that would sit with me and take me forever to put together my thoughts on and poison the movie for me.
Richard O'Brien? THE Lawrence Fletcher?!
Still no answer to the important question: “ Do you think she effectively utilized girl power by funneling money to illegal paramilitary death squads in Northern Ireland?”
Activating super nerd autist mode like a sleeper agent when Abi says “[Richard E Grant] never got to play Doctor Who, which is wild” because he technically got to play the Doctor twice (though not canonically). He was in the Red Nose Day special ‘The Curse of Fatal Death’ and played a flash-animated incarnation of the character in the 2003 series “Scream of the Shalka”.
This video has made me unironically want them to do 'Triumph of the Will'. Abi- 'It's terrifying when you consider the use of old imagery to superimpose an entirely new point of view that was never intended.' Devon- 'Look it's fascist and evil, but I cant lie the cinematoraphy pleased me. I had a good time'. Nova- 'That medal meant he would have fought in the prussian-austrian war which I'm sorry, I hope someone got fired for that!'
If you ever get the chance, please do the American version of Spice World: Space Jam, if for no other reason than it has the greatest soundtrack of any movie ever made
Also since you mentioned Grease, the guy who wrote it based it off his experiences at Taft High School in Chicago. Another person who went to that high school at the same time is Robert Hanssen, the spy. So technically he is skulking around in the background during that movie the whole time.
"The Spice Girls are the Hezbollah of Britain" - November Kelly
I'll gladly watch Spice World but nice try Nova, you could never convince me to emigrate to the UK
Jesus the psychic damage i took when you mentioned Phil Greaves. I'm almost certain he's the guy I remember him being and if he is I remember distinctly calling for the organisation I was a member of to disavow his organisation for their transphobic turn back in like 2018. otherwise an all-timer episode good shit
You know who else Geri Halliwell thought was Girl Power? A little lady known as Maggie Thatcher...
The "UN of Spice Girls" is basically what Sinatra proposed in Oceans 11. Shout out to Roger Moore who, from the mid 90s onward, just took roles where he could sit in a room and bang out all his shots in one day.
Oh god, the rescue remedies. November mentioning that those were in the movie sent me reeling back too. I can so clearly picture the taste and the texture and the raw lack of effectiveness a decade later.
my driving instructor insisted on me taking rescue remedy because i was nervous >.<
This movie came out the year I was born, wow!
If you want another sterling Richard E Grant performance I recommend Hudson Hawk.
Also a heist movie.
My sister and I, being american and not know what posh meant, assumed Victoria Beckham was Scary Spice because even back then she had such a severe looking person.
Richard E Grant really said, "When the beat drops I'm gonna fucking kill myself"
What I've always wondered is if they held open auditions for the Spice Girls, how it is they only found one person who could sing and/or dance?
Union Jack minidresses causing havoc in rural Ireland every Halloween and New Years' throughout the mid-90s.
YOOOOO KRAFTIDIOTEN LFG
Another Alan Cumming cameo girl group movie, check out Josie and the Pussycats. A movie better than it deserves to be.
The early TWOAP on this one is a stone cold banger.
"Geri is the best actress." Replay that cameo on Sex in the City. "SaMANtha JOnes hOW ArE YOu????!!"
I can’t believe you didn’t recognise ‘pregnant best friend’ as being played by Toshiko from Torchwood!!
And Sarah in Absolutely Fabulous!
I cant wait for you all to do St Trinians
As it is a heist film ;)
Was this movie the reason for the Spaced jokes where she gets an interview with a feminist magazine and she blows the interview and then she says "girl power" and puts up a peace sign. Then she gets home and tells Tim she blew it and he says "did you do this" and holds up a peace sign and she sadly nods and he bites his fist in panic?
My desert... my Arrakis... my Spice World
Can we please get more Devon singing i am asking this very forcefully
1:17:00 for anyone interested (despite the racist line)
Perfect Garth Marenghi's dark place ass "What's going on"
If someone asking Nova ‘why do you talk like that’ would destroy her it’s probably for the best I showed Devon my very long KJB drinking game with their various vocal tics and not her. I just have the kind of brain that hoards this sort of thing
Never seen this movie but it does rule that Richard E Grant's character proposes R Budd Dwyering himself in front of a sold out audience of Spice Girls fans. Also Phil Greaves shoutout, hell yeah, maybe nobody more annoyingly vindicated
Got me feeling like a white R Budd Dwyer.
I appreciate a survivable second spice capability.
I LOVED this movie as a kid, completely cringe worthy. It lives rent free in my head 😆
Richard E Grant actually DID play Doctor Who! He was the Shalka Doctor, an animated special from the period it was cancelled!
The ansaphone recording with him and the Master giggling is so delightful I want it as my own voicemail message.
I object to the critique of s club 7
Mel B is bisexual and apparently once hooked up with Geri… according to google
She suggested she did on an interview with Johnathan Ross and then walked it back the next day
they don’t want girl power, they want to endlessly critique girl power
Hit like a truck by the TA Core logo in the most unexpected of places!
Re: Marylin Monroe can’t act, obviously false if anyone has like seen her in movies but I really recommend people see her in DON’T BOTHER TO KNOCK, a playing against type noir before she had a type and just do not look up anything else about it go in blind
Oh this is delightful. This movie... i was circa 10 and movie night:' shew me this and priscilla and dreams and that is why i am as i am
My son was induced a year ago, Abi is 100% correct all the best babies are induced.
Regarding heist films featuring mayors, It'd be fun to see a KJB: Robbery Season episode featuring Mattie Lubchansky, and Riley Quinn of The No Gods No Mayors Podcast about the 2013 mayor focused crime film American Hustle. Topics may include the specificity of the acting choices, the inherent low rentedness of mayoral crime, and how the director is an enemy of the pod.
Within the principles set forth by Nove in The Card Counter, those who have Historical Allegations on their Wikipedia page are de facto enemies of the pod. May they become Damnatio memoriae.
Alan Cumming was also in Josie and the Pussycats, which was kind of the American Spice World but good.
the early The Worst of All Possible Worlds ep on Josie is iconic. It's their first best episode.
I will increase my donation to the patreon so Devon can get the Prince style assless suit in every color of the rainbow 🌈
For a couple years the only thing I knew about the spice girls was Mel B's appearance on the eric andre show, and from what I can tell from this episode it was an accurate summation of their politics
Bikini Kill coined the slogan "Girl Power" and Spice Girls stole it, which is probably the most nakedly anti-feminist thing about them. Utterly neutered the message.
I bought "Spice" on CD when it came out, and listened to it for decades. Hell, now I want to listen to it again. I regret nothing.
THANK YOU
there’s a fantastic youtube poop of this movie called richard e grant’s prozac party lol
off work with brain fog due to damage, this is perfect thank you
Truly one of the greatest “wait is that?” Movies ever made
This was a media cornerstone for 8 years old me. Absolutely perfect choice.
Cursed trivia: they attempted to do a 'guy we love to see' cameo for Gary Glitter but they obviously had to cut it after things...occurred.
Devon, bless you
Oh they're finally doing Dune
mahdi spice
I wanted to be baby spice as a young child which I'm sure was in no way predictive of me turning out to be trans
Same
Strapping in, this is gonna be great
Had to reset the clock almost immediately for the Dune joke
Let's gooooooo
YES
Iconic! I still have this on vhs