Sisters first.
Podcasters also.
Falling In Love Montage began in February 2016 when sisters Helen and Valerie decided, on Helen's whim, that the world needed a podcast dedicated entirely to chick flicks, rom-coms, lady thrillers, period pieces, and whatever else falls under the vast and gloriously subjective umbrella of "movies commercially marketed toward women."
"I have a vague outline of an idea — not fully an idea — about you and me starting a podcast where we discuss “chick flicks” of all types. And we have some sort of tampon/star rating system or something." - Helen (12/01/2015)
What began as an instant message has grown into a decade-long catalog of over 160 episodes, covering everything from Dirty Dancing to Cats, from Clueless to Crank.
Yes, Crank. We stand by it.
Helen
Podcaster. Poet. Parent. pUX pResearcher.
Valerie
"I swear on my bus pass"
Over the years, Falling In Love Montage has been part of two podcast networks. We spent time with Comrade Radio and later The Flying Machine, collaborating with other creators and expanding our reach beyond two sisters objectifying Hugh Grant and conscripting their partners into representing men as a monolith every other episode.
In our early days, we ran a beloved segment called "Ask a Matt" — exactly what it sounds like. We'd bring on a male guest (most often named Matt) to offer "the dude's" perspective on whatever chick flick we were covering that episode. The segment ran its course, but the Matts left their mark.
Is it a chick flick? We have a system for that.
Every film we cover gets scored using our proprietary, scientifically dubious, tampon-based rating system. Three or more tampons and it's officially a Chick Flick. Fewer than three? Not a Chick Flick — sorry, we don't make the rules. (We literally do make the rules.)
The checklist awards points based on four categories: the presence of chick flick tropes (quarter tampon each), featured performers from our curated list (quarter tampon each), whether the film is adapted from a Jane Austen, Terry McMillan, or Nicholas Sparks novel (one full tampon), and whether it fails the reverse Bechdel test (up to one full tampon).
For the first stretch of the podcast, the tampon score was completely subjective and arbitrary. The structured checklist came later, once we realized we needed a system that was at least pretending to be objective. Scores on earlier episodes reflect our gut feelings at the time, not the checklist methodology.
We also give out awards. Made-up ones.
The Houseman Trophy is a proprietary and entirely made-up award given to any chick flick we feel does exceptional feminist work for the genre. It's named after Frances "Baby" Houseman of Dirty Dancing, a woman who carried a watermelon, stood up for what was right, and never let anybody put her in a corner.
The Kat Stratocaster Award goes to films where the movie itself may not be a feminist triumph, but the protagonist does good feminist work in spite of it. Named after Kat Stratford from 10 Things I Hate About You. Kat was fierce, unapologetic, and better than the movie probably deserved.
The Houseman Trophy was first conceived during our Ghostbusters episode — and retroactively awarded to Dirty Dancing, duh. The Kat Stratocaster came to be during our 10 Things I Hate About You episode, named for the character who inspired it.
You may have noticed, we are but mere mortals and thus not immune to the occasional cessation in objectivity or impulsive whim. We are, in fact, often moved by our own meandering rhetoric and we have, on occasion, talked ourselves out of awarding the Houseman trophy to some fairly worthy cinema, while at other times, talked ourselves into bestowing it on some… "unexpected" films (read: Snatched). We try to hold ourselves to consistent standards, but just like Baby, we don't thrive in a corner.