sometimes I love reading outside the fandoms with which I'm really familiar for that very reason—when thematically, a story's that complete and thought-provoking in itself, it can be really rewarding! and I think one of the reasons "Uncommon Threads" succeeds is that it takes the dismissive, sexist (and strongly implicitly racist, given casting and the way that society is characterized in the episode) treatment of that "girly" embroidered dress by both Sam the character and the show itself, and just turns a 2D portrayal into something amazing and 3D. I am all up with love for discussion of dynamics of power and privilege and means of production, making visible what's usually invisible in industrialized societies—and a non-condescending exploration, however brief, of what they might mean for women and women's labor in more than one society... well, I would be all over portrayals of "girly" or "chick-flick" subjects in popular media if they habitually included this type of thing. as it is, though the often-overwhelming implicit classism and racism in such portrayals tend to put me off, I do think pervasive sexism in the potential audience is frequently responsible for the undervalued status of "girly" topics in popular media (and of course, if a work has more than a few scenes passing the Bechdel-Wallace rule, it's going to be written off as a chick flick or chick lit or whatever).
Ah, but the portrayal of women in media is like the portrayal of POCs: we don't need to think about it! We claim artistic license! So, of course, "chick flick" almost synonymous with "mindless stereotyped entertainment that reinforces sexist tropes, and often imperialist, anti-Semitic or anti-Muslim, or racist ones as well"! House Bunny, for a recently-watched example. Here is a movie about a woman whose greatest aspiration is to be on the Playboy Bunny calendar, reforming a sorority house of "misfits" (read: interesting individuals with opinions of their own) until they look and act just like her. Watch Barbie Shelley bend over backwards for a date, pretending to be smart until it's revealed that what the guy really wants is for her to be "herself": pretty, sexual, and brainless! Because no matter what anyone says, Playboy Bunnies do not pop fully formed out of the womb; they're made that way. And the movie ends in an uplifting number where the sorority numbers break free from their "ugliness", revealing underneath: thin waists! Big boobs! Long legs! Puffed up lips and no facial piercings!
All the women in the movie, of course, are portrayed as petty, jealous, and small-minded, while the men are even-headed and kind. And even though the movie is comprised of an almost entirely female cast, I'm not sure if it even passes the Bechdel-Wallace test. Not a word of anything real. No "Uncommon Threads" here.
You know what really pisses me off about all this, and all the movies like this one?
So, of course, "chick flick" almost synonymous with "mindless stereotyped entertainment that reinforces sexist tropes, and often imperialist, anti-Semitic or anti-Muslim, or racist ones as well"!
Woooord to all of that!
All the women in the movie, of course, are portrayed as petty, jealous, and small-minded, while the men are even-headed and kind. And even though the movie is comprised of an almost entirely female cast, I'm not sure if it even passes the Bechdel-Wallace test.
Well, thank you for the synopsis; I hadn't heard about the movie before. All told I'm feeling the need for a primal scream coming on. My new catchphrase may be something a friend said a couple of days ago: "All the vague faith I had that women are people when Observe and Report tanked is lost"... while House Bunny is (I begrudgingly admit) not as low as O&R, it's all part of the same picture, as you and I know.
(Sorry I took so long getting back to you, by the way: the computer and myself were undergoing a trial separation. Obviously, I was weak and fell right back into its seductive little arms. Which is to say, in a slightly more obtuse fashion: I was grounded.)
it's cool. I hope the grounding is over! I'm glad you have computer privileges back (if you do?).
one of my favorite blogs summarizes the Seth Rogen O&R date-rape scene, which is played for laughs in the movie. (http://www.safercampus.org/blog/?p=992) (that's "funny" because the victim's personality is established as "slutty" and a stuck-up "bitch"! and, you know, though she was already covered in her own vomit and falling down intoxicated with pills and booze before the rape, Anna Faris's character suddenly regains consciousness and yells at Rogen's character to continue, then passes out again! so he's perfectly justified in keeping on with the rape! no consequences, no acknowledgment afterward whatsoever in the movie that it might really be rape. and the clearly intended "lesson" of the film is that an incredibly repulsive person who does many other horrific things in the course of the film—well, if he's a man, all he really needs is the love of a woman to uplift him. all told, for a significant number of viewers... even if they concede it might be rape, they think she deserves it.) tigerbeatdown covers it thoroughly and concisely (http://tigerbeatdown.blogspot.com/2009/04/um.html), linking to the red band trailer (which includes the rape scene) and analyzing press coverage, including an interview with Faris at the Onion AV Club and enragingly (predicably?) appalling reviews by major publications such as the New York Times and Rolling Stone. "despise" isn't a strong enough word... maybe "abominate" would be closer? the message of that scene is evil. the movie's message is evil. I abominate Seth Rogen and his self-congratulatory rape-apologist interviews, and all the other rape apologists defending him and this movie.
blackcurrant commented:
... movies are escapism, right? Unless, of course, you happen to be one of those unfortunate creatures for whom misogyny is an inescapable part of life.
I am SO tired of people equating "escapism" and "not needing to be aware of anything real or how real people might react to your REAL MOVIE." I am such a fan of escapism, but it requires just as much respect for your world and your audience as anything else! Of course I guess a key issue here is that these people have no respect for their audience to begin with, but still.
Also, it's absurd to think that your audience would want to escape into something that's conceivably worse than their actual lives. Call it, I don't know, 'gritty cinema verite', but not 'escapist comedy'. Don't try to sell a story about a sociopath working a crappy job, in which there are multiple sexual assaults as a hilarious comedy. Making something horrible into straight comedy- not even black comedy, but, like, slap-stick- serves, in part, to normalize the behavior. Presentation is important: there's a difference between laughing at something despite how horrible it is- or because of how horrible it is, because if you don't laugh, you'll cry- and laughing at something horrible because you've been told that the horror is actually the funny part.
That's what irks me about Rogan's Taxi Driver comparison: Martin Scorsese never intended the audience to identify with Travis Bickle, or to think that he just needed the love of a good woman or that his actions were anything but beyond the pale. Nothing in Taxi Driver is normalized; the whole point of the movie is that the city of New York is collapsing under the weight of its own misery and indifference to human life, and that such an environment will inevitably produce only the most emotionally-void people. I know it's sort of weird to pick on that bit, of all the offensive crap that comes out of that guy, but it's sort of pathetic that he can't even get his own apologist arguments right. ...
Maybe I should write a comedy. I'd call it "Read and Type", about a female blogger who gets her jollies writing humorless feminist reviews of misogynist movies she hasn't even seen. When her readers reply to her posts with, variously, "You just don't get what he's trying to say", or "Lighten up, bitch", she copy-pastes the replies back at the posters until they get frustrated and leave. And then she laughs. Oh, how she laughs. ...
If "Observe and Report" had been, say, a harrowing peek into the secret, quietly desperate world of a man driven to emotional numbness and horrifying displays of 'masculinity' by a society that neither understands nor particularly likes people of either sex, it might have been a good movie. Hell, if it had been an honest look at what a dysfunctional, unhappy, desperate character its protagonist had become instead of laughing off both his stupidity and his violence as 'just the way guys are- jeez, what are you, some kind of girl?', it could have been great.
But it's not, so it's just another cinematic toilet.
belmanoir responded to another commenter at her journal:
I love Holocaust humor, for example. I love "The Great Dictator" and "The Producers" and Vonnegut's "Mother Night" and so on. But that is very different from, like, a wacky sitcom set in Auschwitz with a lovable commandant and his nagging wife, and the hijinx that ensue when he has to repair one of the ovens even though he's bad with tools. You know what I mean? A black comedy about date rape might be difficult to watch, it might not turn out to be my thing, but at least I could feel okay about its existence.
I, um. Wow. Don't really have any reaction to this except: squirm. And perhaps a gratuitous "yuck".
The sad thing, of course, is that I can see how this might be taken as a joke by some people. A funny one, even. I actually know people who would laugh at it, no further thought needed, and if that's not fucked in the head, I don't know what is.
I suppose they call it rape culture for a reason, don't they?
(subject line taken from a comment by snobographer on a positive review of a film about dudes who can't stand it when their girlfriends are smarter than they are.)
The sad thing, of course, is that I can see how this might be taken as a joke by some people. A funny one, even. I actually know people who would laugh at it, no further thought needed, and if that's not fucked in the head, I don't know what is.
I know people who would, too. there's the "she deserves it!" camp, the "bitch is too 'stupid' to realize it's rape if it is even rape, so who cares?" camp... I wish I didn't know people who've expressed those types of sentiments to my face, but there you go. and I wish I could say they didn't have a face after saying that to me, but violence is wrong and sometimes also a felony, so I have to restrict myself to scathing remarks. I totally sympathize with blackcurrant's hypothetical Read and Type blogger, because that's how I often feel! but with fewer laughs on my part.
I suppose they call it rape culture for a reason, don't they?
oh, and I love this pithy little review (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/may/05/observe-and-report-rape/print) of O&R, also by tigerbeatdown (a.k.a. Sady Doyle), who hits all the crucial issues in no time at all. note: I have javascript turned off by default, which means I don't see any reader comments after the article, but if they do appear when you look at it, please don't read those comments... the Guardian's "Comment Is Free" notoriously attracts the bottom of the barrel in commenters. I say this because I want to protect your sanity as I would like to protect my own!
Mm. Generally, I tend to avoid things on the bottom of pages, whether they be advertisements, comments, or credits; it's like the ocean. All the crap seems to settle towards the bottom. But thanks for the advance warning.
Generally, I tend to avoid things on the bottom of pages, whether they be advertisements, comments, or credits; it's like the ocean. All the crap seems to settle towards the bottom.
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branchandroot
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-02 04:58 am (UTC)Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-02 09:02 pm (UTC)BarbieShelley bend over backwards for a date, pretending to be smart until it's revealed that what the guy really wants is for her to be "herself": pretty, sexual, and brainless! Because no matter what anyone says, Playboy Bunnies do not pop fully formed out of the womb; they're made that way. And the movie ends in an uplifting number where the sorority numbers break free from their "ugliness", revealing underneath: thin waists! Big boobs! Long legs! Puffed up lips and no facial piercings!All the women in the movie, of course, are portrayed as petty, jealous, and small-minded, while the men are even-headed and kind. And even though the movie is comprised of an almost entirely female cast, I'm not sure if it even passes the Bechdel-Wallace test. Not a word of anything real. No "Uncommon Threads" here.
You know what really pisses me off about all this, and all the movies like this one?
People think they're inspirational and uplifting.
!!!
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-02 09:57 pm (UTC)Woooord to all of that!
All the women in the movie, of course, are portrayed as petty, jealous, and small-minded, while the men are even-headed and kind. And even though the movie is comprised of an almost entirely female cast, I'm not sure if it even passes the Bechdel-Wallace test.
Well, thank you for the synopsis; I hadn't heard about the movie before. All told I'm feeling the need for a primal scream coming on. My new catchphrase may be something a friend said a couple of days ago: "All the vague faith I had that women are people when Observe and Report tanked is lost"... while House Bunny is (I begrudgingly admit) not as low as O&R, it's all part of the same picture, as you and I know.
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-14 03:25 am (UTC)(Sorry I took so long getting back to you, by the way: the computer and myself were undergoing a trial separation. Obviously, I was weak and fell right back into its seductive little arms. Which is to say, in a slightly more obtuse fashion: I was grounded.)
WARNING for triggers re: rape
Date: 2009-05-14 09:59 am (UTC)one of my favorite blogs summarizes the Seth Rogen O&R date-rape scene, which is played for laughs in the movie. (http://www.safercampus.org/blog/?p=992) (that's "funny" because the victim's personality is established as "slutty" and a stuck-up "bitch"! and, you know, though she was already covered in her own vomit and falling down intoxicated with pills and booze before the rape, Anna Faris's character suddenly regains consciousness and yells at Rogen's character to continue, then passes out again! so he's perfectly justified in keeping on with the rape! no consequences, no acknowledgment afterward whatsoever in the movie that it might really be rape. and the clearly intended "lesson" of the film is that an incredibly repulsive person who does many other horrific things in the course of the film—well, if he's a man, all he really needs is the love of a woman to uplift him. all told, for a significant number of viewers... even if they concede it might be rape, they think she deserves it.) tigerbeatdown covers it thoroughly and concisely (http://tigerbeatdown.blogspot.com/2009/04/um.html), linking to the red band trailer (which includes the rape scene) and analyzing press coverage, including an interview with Faris at the Onion AV Club and enragingly (predicably?) appalling reviews by major publications such as the New York Times and Rolling Stone. "despise" isn't a strong enough word... maybe "abominate" would be closer? the message of that scene is evil. the movie's message is evil. I abominate Seth Rogen and his self-congratulatory rape-apologist interviews, and all the other rape apologists defending him and this movie.
blackcurrant commented:
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-14 10:02 am (UTC)Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-21 12:08 am (UTC)The sad thing, of course, is that I can see how this might be taken as a joke by some people. A funny one, even. I actually know people who would laugh at it, no further thought needed, and if that's not fucked in the head, I don't know what is.
I suppose they call it rape culture for a reason, don't they?
... the guy who actually cried because I corrected him on the nutritional content of peanut butter.
Date: 2009-05-21 03:36 pm (UTC)The sad thing, of course, is that I can see how this might be taken as a joke by some people. A funny one, even. I actually know people who would laugh at it, no further thought needed, and if that's not fucked in the head, I don't know what is.
I know people who would, too. there's the "she deserves it!" camp, the "bitch is too 'stupid' to realize it's rape if it is even rape, so who cares?" camp... I wish I didn't know people who've expressed those types of sentiments to my face, but there you go. and I wish I could say they didn't have a face after saying that to me, but violence is wrong and sometimes also a felony, so I have to restrict myself to scathing remarks. I totally sympathize with blackcurrant's hypothetical Read and Type blogger, because that's how I often feel! but with fewer laughs on my part.
I suppose they call it rape culture for a reason, don't they?
yeeeeaaah.
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-21 05:49 pm (UTC)Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-28 10:14 pm (UTC)Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-28 10:52 pm (UTC)a sound philosophy, true!
Re: oh, I forgot to note: SCC episodes are .avi format!
Date: 2009-05-02 10:03 pm (UTC)People think they're inspirational and uplifting.
!!!
... yes, primal scream time!