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IT'S PAT: THE MOVIE
Directed by Adam Bernstein
Written by Quentin Tarantino (part of it)
Released in 1994
Starring Julia Sweeney as Pat Riley, Dave Foley as Chris, Charles Rocket as Kyle Jacobsen, Kathy Griffin as Herself, Julie Hayden as Stacy Jacobsen, Kathy Najimy as Tippy, Arleen Sorkin as Herself, Camille Paglia as Herself and Dean Ween and Gene Ween as Themselves
Many people do not know this, but Pulp Fiction has a bastard sister (or is it a bastard brother?) as far as I'm concerned. An androgynous sibling that has stalked and walked beside it like a creepy fedora and trench coat wearing shadow since 1994. They are fraternal twins -- and I emphasize the word fraternal -- 'cause they are both very, very different, yet in my book, they are absolutely twins. One of them is assured of its own gender in the world, and the other one isn't. One of them knows its place in the world and the other one doesn't. The other one isn't even wanted by most people in the world. One is Pulp, the other is Pat. This review is about Pat. I am going to reveal the secret... that is Pat.
Why are they twins? Most people would never say that they are -- but they ARE. Why? Because both of them arrived in the world in 1994. Both of them featured Julia Sweeney and Kathy Griffin (Harvey Keitel was even supposed to be in It's Pat, but his scene was deleted -- he played a priest, apparently). And weirdest of all -- Quentin Tarantino worked on the It's Pat screenplay. Nobody knows how much he worked on it -- or what he did to it -- but the fact is, HE WORKED ON THE SCREENPLAY, and that's more than what most movies have going for them. This thing was touched by Quentin Tarantino. Yes. He is, in essence, one of its fathers. This is a Quentin Tarantino movie, as far as I'm concerned. He's uncredited as a writer, but that does not matter. He has admitted to working on the script. 'Cause see, he and Julia Sweeney (who plays the mysterious Pat person I'm about to speak about) are friends. Hell, maybe they even dated each other for a time, which would mean that Quentin Tarantino has probably HAD SEX WITH PAT.
It gets crazier -- this is a Saturday Night Live movie. Just like Coneheads, which I recently reviewed. Pat is Pat from the old Saturday Night Live sketches, where Julia Sweeney plays an androgynous person that nobody can guess the sex of. Pat is a chubby, big butted, curly haired, glasses-wearing nerd who happens to be SO OBNOXIOUS. So obnoxious! And just like with the Coneheads, I really haven't seen a lot of Saturday Night Live sketches with Pat. But I have seen It's Pat: The Movie about 90,000 times in my life. And the sad thing is IT JUST KEEPS GETTING BETTER. Like -- I don't like to tell depressed, suicidal gay people, "DON'T WORRY! IT GETS BETTER!" The hell it gets better, coming from my own experiences. Instead, I hand them over a copy of the It's Pat: The Movie DVD, and I tell them -- honestly -- "Watch this a few hundred times - IT GETS BETTER!"
And it does! It really, really does. Last night, I watched It's Pat: The Movie and it was like watching a work of art. This is a sophisticated study of androgyny. The mystery of it. The examination of the appeal of genderless creatures, like David Bowie. What draws us -- fascinates us -- to androgyny? Why do we stare and stalk people whose sex we cannot physically determine when they're wearing clothes? Why are we even fascinated by people like Caitlyn Jenner and transgender folk? Like Charles Rocket, who plays the Kyle character in It's Pat: The Movie, we are mesmerized by genders outside the norm -- because maybe we could be just like them ourselves.
Take the new, popular MoFo, Omnizoa, for example -- is it a man or a woman? Nobody truly knows (though, we all think he's a man, and I think we're right). But listen to Omnizoa speak -- Omni says, "I have no idea what it's like to be male or female. I have never experienced either of them."
How do you really know if you're a man or a woman? Physically, nature imposes a sex on you. You've got a set of genitals down there, whether you like it or not, and you did not choose them. But does that really mean you need to live your life as the gender of the sex that nature imposed upon you? What if you could just live as GENDERLESS? Neither male or female. Is it possible that we ALL are genderless? Maybe we're all both male and female? Why should everybody fixate on one gender to be all the time? Why not dress like a woman sometimes even if you're got a penis? What if it's fun to fool around like that? Why not wear a tuxedo even if you've got a vagina? Why not take your body past the limitations imposed by society and do whatever you want to do? Why not be a woman one day and a man the next? Or how about you just unsubscribe to all of that and simply GO YOUR OWN WAY? Be SOMETHING ELSE!
It's Pat: The Movie is a film that dares to do something outrageous and original like that. You won't believe your eyes as you watch a pair of androgynous freakshows like Pat and Chris fall in love with each other, all while NOBODY in the film has any clue about what sex the two of them are. They throw them an engagement party and hand over gifts in an attempt to find out which will accept the girl gift and which will accept the boy gifts -- these things offer their friends absolutely no answers. Everybody in this movie spends the whole time trying to figure out what sex Pat and Chris actually are -- and you, the viewer, will never truly find out. I still have not found out, although I have my own theories. YES. We KNOW the sexes of the actors playing these characters. Julia Sweeney (Pat) is a woman and Dave Foley (Chris) is a man, but that's the actors! The characters are a MYSTERY SEX.
So, anyway -- this movie. It's the story of an androgynous pest. That's what's so great about it -- it's a film about a genderless person, and the genderless person is absolutely unbearable. You know, nowadays, if they made a film about a genderless person, it would be SO SERIOUS. It would be OFFENSIVE to create a character that's ALTERNATIVE and yet someone most people will despise. They would make Pat nice. They would make Pat all warm and fuzzy and lovable. But the Pat in It's Pat: The Movie is SOMEONE YOU WANNA KILL! And that's what's so great about it. It's a movie about a genderf*ck character that is just THE WORST GENDERF*CK CHARACTER WHO EVER LIVED! He is so obnoxious! He drives people crazy. He lives next door to Kathy Griffin -- who, for some reason, plays herself -- and he treats her like she's his best friend, even though she's FAR FROM IT.
He can't hold a job to save his life. Every three days, he either quits a new job or gets fired. At the beginning of the movie, he's fired from being a postman (or is it postWOMAN?) because he opens up someone's mail and informs somebody that their son wrote them a letter telling them HE'S GAY. "That's life! Accept it and get over it!" Pat explains.
He stalks Kathy Najimy -- you know, that fat witch from Hocus Pocus. The one who rode a vacuum cleaner. She works in a convenience store and she has anxiety attacks every time Pat comes in -- she can't stand him THAT much. In fact, she wants him out so fast that she doesn't even bother making him pay for whatever he buys (usually feminine napkins -- in case Pat's aunt comes to visit). She shoos him out and says, "It's all on me!"
Look at me -- I keep calling Pat "him." Pat does feel like a man to me. His obnoxiousness seems very male -- I don't know hardly any women who have ever been as obnoxious as Pat is. But I guess they do exist, don't they, Miss Vicky?
And like I said, Charles Rocket (an actor who would go on to committing suicide by slicing open his throat with box cutters in 2005) plays Pat's new neighbor, and he becomes TOTALLY obsessed with Pat, to the point that he buys telescopes and things to peep inside Pat's windows. He starts dressing like Pat, he makes a doll that looks like Pat, he tries to seduce Pat one night when he invites Pat over to his apartment. Eventually his wife learns the horrifying truth when she finds her framed wedding photo with Pat's face placed over where her own face is, to make it look like her husband is married to Pat. She packs up and storms out, of course, while Kyle (Rocket's character), in the meantime, steals Pat's laptop diary in an attempt to break the password and read it so he can finally figure out what Pat's sex is.
Pat is also spotted by the band Ween (remember Ween?) who are out driving around in their tour van. Pat had just appeared on a TV show called "America's Creepiest People" (Kyle had filmed Pat doing karaoke at his engagement party and put it on TV) and Ween recognized him, so they asked Pat to film a music video with them. This leads to the obnoxious Pat thinking he's now a major rock star who deserves a recording contract and more gigs with Ween and everything, which horrifies Ween.
Pat steals Kathy Griffin's job as a radio show host called "Love Chat" where she answers people's relationship questions -- she was boring, while Pat, who accidentally gets on the air, answers the questions with a more blunt, obnoxious style ("You wanna kill yourself? DO IT!")
But the heart and soul of the film is Pat's relationship with Chris (Dave Foley), who is another androgynous person that people cannot figure out the sex of. Chris seems very much like a woman, though -- but remember, Chris is played by a man. You don't know for sure. Pat and Chris meet one day at a strip club that Chris works at as a bartender (Pat is in the strip club because he just got a job as a gas man, and he came to read the meter or something.) Anyway, the electricity between Pat and Chris is so intense that they actually shock each other with electricity as they first shake hands. It's love at first sight, especially from the moment when Chris sees Pat bent over a stool, his or her big butt all up in the air.
But the relationship suffers from issues, mainly due to Pat's immaturity and the fact that he or she can't hold a job. They separate and Chris is about to head off to Tibet to go on a year long spiritual quest -- can Pat get back together with Chris in the nick of time? Watch It's Pat: The Movie and find out!
Like I said, this film is the bastard non-binary androgyne of Pulp Fiction. If all of this seems pretty crazy (and it is, believe me), remember: Quentin Tarantino worked on it. Go with it because of that, at least. Dare to venture into the unknown.
I can still remember the first time I heard about this movie. It was 1994 (or maybe 1995?) and I was at Blockbuster Video, looking for something to rent. I saw the box cover for It's Pat: The Movie and -- because it had an androgynous creature on it -- I was mesmerized and fascinated. I actually said out loud, "It's Pat: The Movie? What is this? Who is Pat?" I remember there was an older man walking by me and he laughed at me as I said this. He knew who Pat was and he was secretly fascinated by Pat himself. Or was it herself? Who knows if I actually got laughed at by some man? It very well could have been some woman. You never know if the person next to you that looks like a man... really is a man, you know? It could be a woman. It could be neither.
Watch It's Pat: The Movie and find all about... the mystery... that is PAT.
Directed by Adam Bernstein
Written by Quentin Tarantino (part of it)
Released in 1994
Starring Julia Sweeney as Pat Riley, Dave Foley as Chris, Charles Rocket as Kyle Jacobsen, Kathy Griffin as Herself, Julie Hayden as Stacy Jacobsen, Kathy Najimy as Tippy, Arleen Sorkin as Herself, Camille Paglia as Herself and Dean Ween and Gene Ween as Themselves
Many people do not know this, but Pulp Fiction has a bastard sister (or is it a bastard brother?) as far as I'm concerned. An androgynous sibling that has stalked and walked beside it like a creepy fedora and trench coat wearing shadow since 1994. They are fraternal twins -- and I emphasize the word fraternal -- 'cause they are both very, very different, yet in my book, they are absolutely twins. One of them is assured of its own gender in the world, and the other one isn't. One of them knows its place in the world and the other one doesn't. The other one isn't even wanted by most people in the world. One is Pulp, the other is Pat. This review is about Pat. I am going to reveal the secret... that is Pat.
Why are they twins? Most people would never say that they are -- but they ARE. Why? Because both of them arrived in the world in 1994. Both of them featured Julia Sweeney and Kathy Griffin (Harvey Keitel was even supposed to be in It's Pat, but his scene was deleted -- he played a priest, apparently). And weirdest of all -- Quentin Tarantino worked on the It's Pat screenplay. Nobody knows how much he worked on it -- or what he did to it -- but the fact is, HE WORKED ON THE SCREENPLAY, and that's more than what most movies have going for them. This thing was touched by Quentin Tarantino. Yes. He is, in essence, one of its fathers. This is a Quentin Tarantino movie, as far as I'm concerned. He's uncredited as a writer, but that does not matter. He has admitted to working on the script. 'Cause see, he and Julia Sweeney (who plays the mysterious Pat person I'm about to speak about) are friends. Hell, maybe they even dated each other for a time, which would mean that Quentin Tarantino has probably HAD SEX WITH PAT.
It gets crazier -- this is a Saturday Night Live movie. Just like Coneheads, which I recently reviewed. Pat is Pat from the old Saturday Night Live sketches, where Julia Sweeney plays an androgynous person that nobody can guess the sex of. Pat is a chubby, big butted, curly haired, glasses-wearing nerd who happens to be SO OBNOXIOUS. So obnoxious! And just like with the Coneheads, I really haven't seen a lot of Saturday Night Live sketches with Pat. But I have seen It's Pat: The Movie about 90,000 times in my life. And the sad thing is IT JUST KEEPS GETTING BETTER. Like -- I don't like to tell depressed, suicidal gay people, "DON'T WORRY! IT GETS BETTER!" The hell it gets better, coming from my own experiences. Instead, I hand them over a copy of the It's Pat: The Movie DVD, and I tell them -- honestly -- "Watch this a few hundred times - IT GETS BETTER!"
And it does! It really, really does. Last night, I watched It's Pat: The Movie and it was like watching a work of art. This is a sophisticated study of androgyny. The mystery of it. The examination of the appeal of genderless creatures, like David Bowie. What draws us -- fascinates us -- to androgyny? Why do we stare and stalk people whose sex we cannot physically determine when they're wearing clothes? Why are we even fascinated by people like Caitlyn Jenner and transgender folk? Like Charles Rocket, who plays the Kyle character in It's Pat: The Movie, we are mesmerized by genders outside the norm -- because maybe we could be just like them ourselves.
Take the new, popular MoFo, Omnizoa, for example -- is it a man or a woman? Nobody truly knows (though, we all think he's a man, and I think we're right). But listen to Omnizoa speak -- Omni says, "I have no idea what it's like to be male or female. I have never experienced either of them."
How do you really know if you're a man or a woman? Physically, nature imposes a sex on you. You've got a set of genitals down there, whether you like it or not, and you did not choose them. But does that really mean you need to live your life as the gender of the sex that nature imposed upon you? What if you could just live as GENDERLESS? Neither male or female. Is it possible that we ALL are genderless? Maybe we're all both male and female? Why should everybody fixate on one gender to be all the time? Why not dress like a woman sometimes even if you're got a penis? What if it's fun to fool around like that? Why not wear a tuxedo even if you've got a vagina? Why not take your body past the limitations imposed by society and do whatever you want to do? Why not be a woman one day and a man the next? Or how about you just unsubscribe to all of that and simply GO YOUR OWN WAY? Be SOMETHING ELSE!
It's Pat: The Movie is a film that dares to do something outrageous and original like that. You won't believe your eyes as you watch a pair of androgynous freakshows like Pat and Chris fall in love with each other, all while NOBODY in the film has any clue about what sex the two of them are. They throw them an engagement party and hand over gifts in an attempt to find out which will accept the girl gift and which will accept the boy gifts -- these things offer their friends absolutely no answers. Everybody in this movie spends the whole time trying to figure out what sex Pat and Chris actually are -- and you, the viewer, will never truly find out. I still have not found out, although I have my own theories. YES. We KNOW the sexes of the actors playing these characters. Julia Sweeney (Pat) is a woman and Dave Foley (Chris) is a man, but that's the actors! The characters are a MYSTERY SEX.
So, anyway -- this movie. It's the story of an androgynous pest. That's what's so great about it -- it's a film about a genderless person, and the genderless person is absolutely unbearable. You know, nowadays, if they made a film about a genderless person, it would be SO SERIOUS. It would be OFFENSIVE to create a character that's ALTERNATIVE and yet someone most people will despise. They would make Pat nice. They would make Pat all warm and fuzzy and lovable. But the Pat in It's Pat: The Movie is SOMEONE YOU WANNA KILL! And that's what's so great about it. It's a movie about a genderf*ck character that is just THE WORST GENDERF*CK CHARACTER WHO EVER LIVED! He is so obnoxious! He drives people crazy. He lives next door to Kathy Griffin -- who, for some reason, plays herself -- and he treats her like she's his best friend, even though she's FAR FROM IT.
He can't hold a job to save his life. Every three days, he either quits a new job or gets fired. At the beginning of the movie, he's fired from being a postman (or is it postWOMAN?) because he opens up someone's mail and informs somebody that their son wrote them a letter telling them HE'S GAY. "That's life! Accept it and get over it!" Pat explains.
He stalks Kathy Najimy -- you know, that fat witch from Hocus Pocus. The one who rode a vacuum cleaner. She works in a convenience store and she has anxiety attacks every time Pat comes in -- she can't stand him THAT much. In fact, she wants him out so fast that she doesn't even bother making him pay for whatever he buys (usually feminine napkins -- in case Pat's aunt comes to visit). She shoos him out and says, "It's all on me!"
Look at me -- I keep calling Pat "him." Pat does feel like a man to me. His obnoxiousness seems very male -- I don't know hardly any women who have ever been as obnoxious as Pat is. But I guess they do exist, don't they, Miss Vicky?
And like I said, Charles Rocket (an actor who would go on to committing suicide by slicing open his throat with box cutters in 2005) plays Pat's new neighbor, and he becomes TOTALLY obsessed with Pat, to the point that he buys telescopes and things to peep inside Pat's windows. He starts dressing like Pat, he makes a doll that looks like Pat, he tries to seduce Pat one night when he invites Pat over to his apartment. Eventually his wife learns the horrifying truth when she finds her framed wedding photo with Pat's face placed over where her own face is, to make it look like her husband is married to Pat. She packs up and storms out, of course, while Kyle (Rocket's character), in the meantime, steals Pat's laptop diary in an attempt to break the password and read it so he can finally figure out what Pat's sex is.
Pat is also spotted by the band Ween (remember Ween?) who are out driving around in their tour van. Pat had just appeared on a TV show called "America's Creepiest People" (Kyle had filmed Pat doing karaoke at his engagement party and put it on TV) and Ween recognized him, so they asked Pat to film a music video with them. This leads to the obnoxious Pat thinking he's now a major rock star who deserves a recording contract and more gigs with Ween and everything, which horrifies Ween.
Pat steals Kathy Griffin's job as a radio show host called "Love Chat" where she answers people's relationship questions -- she was boring, while Pat, who accidentally gets on the air, answers the questions with a more blunt, obnoxious style ("You wanna kill yourself? DO IT!")
But the heart and soul of the film is Pat's relationship with Chris (Dave Foley), who is another androgynous person that people cannot figure out the sex of. Chris seems very much like a woman, though -- but remember, Chris is played by a man. You don't know for sure. Pat and Chris meet one day at a strip club that Chris works at as a bartender (Pat is in the strip club because he just got a job as a gas man, and he came to read the meter or something.) Anyway, the electricity between Pat and Chris is so intense that they actually shock each other with electricity as they first shake hands. It's love at first sight, especially from the moment when Chris sees Pat bent over a stool, his or her big butt all up in the air.
But the relationship suffers from issues, mainly due to Pat's immaturity and the fact that he or she can't hold a job. They separate and Chris is about to head off to Tibet to go on a year long spiritual quest -- can Pat get back together with Chris in the nick of time? Watch It's Pat: The Movie and find out!
Like I said, this film is the bastard non-binary androgyne of Pulp Fiction. If all of this seems pretty crazy (and it is, believe me), remember: Quentin Tarantino worked on it. Go with it because of that, at least. Dare to venture into the unknown.
I can still remember the first time I heard about this movie. It was 1994 (or maybe 1995?) and I was at Blockbuster Video, looking for something to rent. I saw the box cover for It's Pat: The Movie and -- because it had an androgynous creature on it -- I was mesmerized and fascinated. I actually said out loud, "It's Pat: The Movie? What is this? Who is Pat?" I remember there was an older man walking by me and he laughed at me as I said this. He knew who Pat was and he was secretly fascinated by Pat himself. Or was it herself? Who knows if I actually got laughed at by some man? It very well could have been some woman. You never know if the person next to you that looks like a man... really is a man, you know? It could be a woman. It could be neither.
Watch It's Pat: The Movie and find all about... the mystery... that is PAT.