Sunday, July 03, 2011

Bridesmaids review (GBSW)

From Great Britain's Socialist Worker:


Bridesmaids: laughing together, not laughed at


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Bridesmaids is not a ‘chick flick’ trying to empower women

Bridesmaids is not a ‘chick flick’ trying to empower women


Sally Campbell, celebrates Bridesmaids, a new film that undermines many Hollywood stereotypes

Movies about weddings are normally about finding “true love”. They are not all bad films by any means, but neither are they films I would run to the cinema to catch on their opening weekend.

So I approached with caution Bridesmaids, the new film from producer Judd Apatow.

But as I watched it I felt like I was in a parallel cinema universe. Women were allowed to be funny—as in tell jokes, not just fall over or be the butt of jokes between men—and be different shapes and sizes, and be skint.

Bridesmaids is written by two comedians, Kristen Wiig and Annie Mumolo, known in the US for their appearances on renowned TV comedy sketch show Saturday Night Live. And this is part of what makes this film different from—and better than—Apatow’s other productions.

This film is about a woman, Annie (Wiig), who feels her life is going down the pan. She lost her business in the recession and is now stuck as a sales assistant in a particularly depressing jewellery shop.

She subjects herself to a self-destructive sexual relationship with rich and handsome Ted—played by John Hamm, better known as Mad Men’s Don Draper.

Grubby

This is a more real and grubby depiction of men like Draper, who never give a thought to what the women they are sleeping with might want or need.

She is living in a manky flat-share in Milwaukee with a bizarre Englishman (Matt Lucas) and his even weirder sister.

When her best friend, Lillian (Maya Rudolph), gets engaged it shines a light on Annie’s sense of failure. As maid of honour, Annie has to organise the pre-wedding events—a hen night, a “bridal shower” (apparently such things exist), and so on.

Each is more disastrous than the last and Annie begins to fear she will lose her best friend too.

Bridesmaids gently laughs at the ridiculousness of weddings, and at the insane expense of them. Annie’s already stretched-to-the-limit finances can’t cope with the demands put on her as the wedding slips out of her control and into the hands of country club member Helen.

The bridesmaids decide to fly to Las Vegas for the hen night, so Annie is stuck back in economy while the rest of the party are in first class. They all pick the $800 designer bridesmaids dresses while she desperately tries to convince them to go for the cheaper number.

I noticed that Annie had just one pair of dress shoes, which she wore at each catastrophic event.

This isn’t Sex and the City—the cast don’t spend their time discussing shoes and clothes and hair.

But there are believable, funny interactions between women who are friends. This is so rare on the big screen that it makes you look back at women in comedy.

There was a golden age of the screwball comedies in the 1930s and 1940s, when women such as Katharine Hepburn and Barbara Stanwyck had the best lines, but after the war this largely dried up.

Women were either femmes fatale in the noir thrillers or suffering mothers and wives in the melodramas.

Funny women shrank down to the TV screen and stayed there for the next few decades.

And even here women who were allowed to be funny in their own right rather than through their relations to men are in a tiny minority.

True

Some of the best female-led comedies of recent years have a message: you don’t need a man to be happy! True enough.

For example look at Miss Congeniality 2, an excellent female buddy movie which ends with Sandra Bullock discarding the pink garb and make-up she acquired in the original film.

But perhaps the attitude is more surprising in a film produced by Apatow who brought us the so-called “slacker comedies” over the last few years.

I have to confess to being a fan of The 40-Year-Old Virgin, which has a soft beating heart and gently ridicules its laddish younger characters.

But I had to turn off Superbad after 15 minutes as I couldn’t take any more grotesque teenage boy humour.

But it may be significant that director Paul Feig is better known for his work on TV in directing episodes of Arrested Development, Nurse Jackie and the US Office.

And it’s refreshing that Bridesmaids isn’t a “chick flick” trying to empower us.

It is a movie about people, who are women, who are in their 30s and have wrinkles and not enough money, and who are funny. Like people are.

Even if this doesn’t sound like your cup of tea—and if you are squeamish I would recommend covering your eyes and ears in the truly gross gown fitting scene—then at least be pleased that it exists.

© Socialist Worker (unless otherwise stated). You may republish if you include an active link to the original.

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Highlights

This piece is written by Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude, Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix, Kat of Kat's Korner, Betty of Thomas Friedman is a Great Man, Mike of Mikey Likes It!, Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz, Ruth of Ruth's Report, Marcia of SICKOFITRADLZ, Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends, Ann of Ann's Mega Dub, Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts and Wally of The Daily Jot. Unless otherwise noted, we picked all highlights.


"I Hate The War" -- most requested highlight and if you wonder why, Ty tells us that most e-mailers made a positive comment about the decision to begin covering Libya as well.

Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Let Someone Else Lead" -- America's princess got called out, didn't he? Is that why the little angel stomped his feet in last week's press conference and snarled that he was leading 'all the time'? What a jerk.


"Iraq snapshot" -- C.I. reports on the Senate's Homeland Security Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management, Federal Workforce and DC hearing on Iraq -- and the State Dept.'s plans.

"F**k Free Speech Radio News" and "What does this picture say?" -- Trina and Mike call out the silences on Iraq from Pacifica and NPR. Radio was also covered last week by Ann:





"The twittering Barack" & "THIS JUST IN! THE TWIT WILL TWEET!" -- As Cedric and Wally point out, he might be able to handle Twitter.

"Libya" -- Elaine on one of Barack's many illegal wars.


"The homophobic columnist" -- Betty explains she's tired of Margaret Kimberly's snide and dismissive attacks on LGBT rights.


"Yes, he is a dick" -- Ruth doesn't mince words.

"The sad and pathetic Janeane Garofalo" -- Ibid.

"Tom Petty needs to grow the hell up" -- Kat points out that we're all getting a little bored with musicians who want to sell tunes to everyone but have a hissy fit when a Republican uses one of their songs at a campaign rally. Grow the hell up or make it clear in all your advertising that you only want a certain type of buyer.

"Petraeus" -- Elaine on the new CIA head. (He's been confirmed since Elaine wrote her post.)

"They work together to harm us" -- Mike on the Dems and Republicans tag-team efforts to hurt working Americans.

"Just a make over" and "THIS JUST IN! WHO IS THIS????" -- Cedric and Wally document how America's princess needed a little make over.

"Cable news"-- Kat ways in on cable.

"Strike two for Julie Mason" and "Julie Mason, Learn Your Profession" -- Marcia takes on bad reporting.


"Raising Cain" and "The Seduction of Joe Tynan" -- Stan goes to the movies.

"the good news, the bad news" -- Rebecca breaks it down.


"Idiot of the Week" -- Mike awards it to the Dick.

"Bell Pepper Salad in the Kitchen" -- Trina offers a simple summer recipe.

"Green: Forever disappointing" -- Betty's not pleased with the Greens (silent on Barry's Afghanistan 'plan' but endorsing the 'rebels' in Libya).

"the funniest article of the year" -- Rebecca finds a hilarious article.


"I was hoping someone had stolen that Van" -- Stan on Van Jones.

"Lame Duck Turkey" -- Isaiah dips into the archives.
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Sunday, June 26, 2011

Truest statement of the week

I would -- I would argue that it's not so much the transition home as it is the disconnect. This country isn't at war. The service members are at war. And when service members get home and they realize that there's no one in this entire country that understands that and understands what they've gone through and wants to listen to them, when the media is continually talking about American Idol or some other pop issue instead of dealing with the actual issues -- that we are conducting two occupations currently, that we are conducting operations in Pakistan, that we are conducting operations in Libya and Yemen. We have service members on the ground in all of these countries and those service members are experiencing things and they are doing it as they believe on behalf of their country and their country doesn't even know it. The country doesn't even know what we do. And then we get home. And then there's nothing. There's no way to connect that. And that disconnect, that's the crime and that's the PTSD. That's-that's all of the trauma right there -- is the inability to understand what happened and why no one else understands. In fact, that's actually the definition of trauma: It's an experience that you haven't processed and therefore you can't communicate it. You keep rewinding it in your head. You keep trying to relive it over and over and over again which is why you have nightmares, why you have dreams, why you have anxiety. But you can't because you never actually experienced it the first time. And when you get home, there's no one that's experienced these wars. And that's -- that's where the trauma exists.

-- Aaron Hughes, Iraq Veterans Against the War appearing on KOOP's Rag Radio which IVAW has posted the audio to.
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Truest statement of the week II

"So from Janis [Joplin] I learned that to make it as a female musician in a man’s world is gonna be tough and you need to keep your head held high. From Jimi [Hendrix] I learned grace and humility."

-- Stevie Nicks to Helen Brown (Telegraph of London).
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Truest statement of the week III

Ah yes, those glorious days of "unity" – when no one, save a brave few, dared stand up against the war hysteria. When anyone who looked vaguely Muslim was attacked in the streets. United in hatred and fear — what a grotesque nostalgia for our "progressive" president to give voice to! Like his predecessor, Obama has often praised this mystic post-9/11"unity," including twice in this speech, and therein lies the mark of the tyrant, who always welcomes the unthinking submission to authority wartime brings.

This war-narrative is getting threadbare, however, and has some significant gaps: suddenly, we are told that, seemingly out of nowhere, "our focus shifted," and "a second war was launched" – apparently all by itself, by means of spontaneous combustion. One hardly expects him to mention of the key role played by his own party, which stood by and cowered – or cheered – as George W. Bush led the nation down into the quagmire, banners flying. But the distancing act – "by the time I took office" – is a little too glib: Bush gets all the blame for Iraq, and the decision to escalate the Afghan war is pushed off on "our military commanders." But isn’t Obama the commander-in-chief?

Our president, a prisoner of history, bravely confronts circumstances shaped by others. He praises himself for making "one of the most difficult decisions I’ve made as President," the launching of the "surge" in which 30,000 more troops were sent to the supposedly neglected Afghan front. "We set clear objectives," he avers, and yet our ultimate goal was – and still is – obscured in murk: does anyone, including the President, know what victory looks like?


-- Justin Raimondo, "Obama Soldiers On" (Antiwar.com).

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A note to our readers

Hey --

Another Sunday. We're publishing at what's becoming our usual time.


First up, we thank all who participated this edition which includes Dallas and the following:

The Third Estate Sunday Review's Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess and Ava,
Rebecca of Sex and Politics and Screeds and Attitude,
Betty of Thomas Friedman Is a Great Man,
C.I. of The Common Ills and The Third Estate Sunday Review,
Kat of Kat's Korner (of The Common Ills),
Cedric of Cedric's Big Mix,
Mike of Mikey Likes It!,
Elaine of Like Maria Said Paz),
Ruth of Ruth's Report,
Wally of The Daily Jot,
Trina of Trina's Kitchen,
Marcia of SICKOFITRDLZ,
Stan of Oh Boy It Never Ends,
Isaiah of The World Today Just Nuts,
and Ann of Ann's Mega Dub.

It was a long edition. A Green piece and two Iraq pieces bit the dust along with a music piece and one on Barack's speech.

What did we come up with?

This is Aaron Hughes and we all agreed on this. We had a problem with three we wanted to note on Barack's speech last week. We had planned to fold those into a piece on the speech. The mistake we made was in doing it as a group effort. We should have let Ava and C.I. tackle it by themselves. Instead we had a mishmash that was unreadable.
But we all agreed Stevie Nicks had a truest and we are supposed to be following the arts as well as politics.

But we ended up going with three statements because we really needed something on the speech. So this is Justin Raimondo who did one of the strongest commentaries on Barack's bad speech.


We were doing a piece on marriage equality that didn't work and we were taking a break. I grabbed Isaiah's sketch pad just because it was there (Isaiah was visiting this week at C.I.'s place) and saw this.

for jim's note

It really turned the idea that wasn't working into an editorial with several more points to make. C.I. was adament that it go up first at The Common Ills so that Isaiah didn't have to do a second comic. We were all in agreement with that.

Ava and C.I. love Fran and when everyone wanted to take a sleep break, they had just finished this piece. They agreed. Which is surprising. Or was until I read it. I want to note that Ava and C.I. don't play favorites. They critiqued Fran's new show strongly despite their feelings for Fran. That's what real critics do. Even if it depresses them to do so. Ava and C.I. also edited my title. I had titled their piece "She got custody of all the laughs." They argued it should be "She got custody of the laughs" because that's how you talk -- not "all." They were right.

If you're on a data plan on your cell phone or laptop (and there is talk of putting those into effect for all internet traffic), you can't afford to be streaming things you didn't want to stream. ABC News' pages are automatically starting to stream a commercial and then a news video. They need to stop that or they need to start picking up your data plan fee.

Michael Ratner's powerful commentary would have stood out as a radio moment any week.

Katty Kay. Erasing Iraq and all the destruction she helped foster.

Andrew Cuomo's statement about New York's marriage equality.

A repost from Great Britain's Socialist Worker.

A repost from Workers World.

As I noted at the top, we lost two Iraq pieces we had planned. That left us with only one so I was able to badger C.I. into letting us use this.
Mike and the gang wrote this and we thank them for it.



Peace.

-- Jim, Dona, Ty, Jess, Ava and C.I.
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Editorial: We need a leader

The 'fierce advocate' for gay rights can't bring himself to support marriage equality. But don't worry, America, he's views are "evolving."


let someone else be the leader

[Illustration is Isaiah's The World Today Just Nuts "Let Someone Else Be A Leader."]


Evolving?

He has to 'evolve' to equality? He's not already on board with that?

This is the man who gave a big F-YOU to the LGBT community in 2007 by putting 'ex-gay' Donnie McClurkin on stage. And, as Kevin Alexander Gray and Marshall Derks (Black Agenda Report) explained, it wasn't just one homophobe put on stage by Barack at that event: "The gay bashing headliners included Reverends Donnie McClurkin and Hezekiah Walker, Pentecostal pastor of Brooklyn mega-church, the Love Fellowship Tabernacle and Mary Mary (a sister act duo)."

What exactly has Barack Obama done for the LGBT community?

A lot of whores love to insist he's done amazing things. He's not done a damn thing. He gets credit for repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell . . . except it hasn't been repealed yet. It hasn't been repealed yet. Barack made that a campaign promise and then went on to dither and ignore it. Under criticism, he finally made a few moves. February 2, 2010, then-Secretary of Defense Robert Gates and Adm Mike Mullen appeared before the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Secretary of Defense Robert Gates: Last week, during the State of the Union address, the president announced that he will work with Congress this year to repeal the law known as Don't Ask, Don't Tell. He subsequently directed the Department of Defense to begin the preparations necessary for a repeal of the current laws and policy. I fully support the president's decision. The question before us is not whether the military prepares to make this change, but how we must -- how we best prepare for it. [. . .] To ensure that the department is prepared should the law be changed, and working in close consultation with Adm Mullen, I have appointed a high-level working group within the department that will immediately begin a review of the issues associated with properly implementing a repeal of the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. The mandate of this working group is to thorougly, objectively and methodically examine all aspects of this question and produce its finding and recommendations in the form of an implementation plan by the end of this calendar year.


"The end of this calendar year" would have been December 2010. It's June 2011 and Don't Ask Don't Tell still hasn't been repealed.

That year-long study was seen by many as a delaying tactic. When November 2010 rolled around, and suddenly Democrats no longer controlled the House of Representatives, Congress finally felt a rush to act. December 18, 2010 (a Saturday!), the Senate took their vote. We'll note this from Senator Joe Lieerman's office:

WASHINGTON, DC – The United States Senate, by a vote of 65-31, today passed legislation that will repeal the discriminatory policy barring homosexuals from serving openly in the military. Senator Joe Lieberman (I-CT), the lead sponsor of the "'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Repeal Act of 2010," issued the following statement:
"Repealing 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' is the right thing to do whether you're liberal, conservative, Democrat, Republican, or independent. It is the right thing to do for our military and the right thing to do for our country. The sixty-five Senators who voted to correct this injustice showed that we're still able to come together in a bipartisan way to fight for America's best interests."


And with the House of Representatives having also passed it, done deal, right? A done deal doesn't require the following.

US House Rep Niki Tsongas: But just to reiterate why we moved to repeal Don't Ask, Don't Tell: Since 1993, more than 14,000 gay service members have been discharged under the discriminatory Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy. And of these discharges, nearly 1,000 were specialists with vital mission critical skills -- Arab linguists, for example. We hear those figures over and over again. I have always believed that this policy actually threatens the readiness of our military by discharging hundreds of military personnel critical to our national security and shutting the door to thousands more. And it's also unconscionable to maintain a policy when at least 24 other countries including allies such as Great Britain, Australia, Canada and Israel already allow open service by lesbian and gay service members. And that's why I've always strongly supported repeal of this policy. And I concur wholeheartedly with Adm Mike Mullen's distinguished leadership about this issue, his assessment when he stated in his testimony before the Armed Services Committee last year that this policy "forces young men and women to lie about who they are in order to defend their fellow citizens." Undermining a basic tenet of military service which is to be honest.


That was Tsongas reminding her Republican colleagues (and at least one Democratic one) on the US House Armed Services Committee April 1st what was what. And she was required to do that because the Republicans who now control the Committee were making it clear that they were not in agreement with repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell. In the Senate, John McCain is gearing up for major opposition to the repeal.

Hopefully, repeal is coming but let's not pretend it's already arrived.


Members of the Cult of St. Barack insist that Barack's done so much more than Bill Clinton. Let's forget for a moment that the claim is false and let's instead note that when Bill Clinton tried to end expulsions of gays and lesbians from the military, when he fought for them to serve openly, not only was he opposed by Colin Powell and many other sex fiends, he was also taking a position that was controversial. He did so because it was the right thing.

Barack Obama shows up in the White House eight years after Bill's out and when the majority of the country favors marriage equality and allowing all Americans with a desire to serve to serve in the military. He's not a leader. Even now when the public supports these changes, Barack can't lead.
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TV: She got custody of the laughs

We love Fran Drescher. Which is why Happily Divorced disappoints us.


111

Fran's new sitcom airs on TV Land (streams at TV Land and at Hulu) and is entitled Happily Divorced. A number of friends have asked us, "Did Fran really not know her husband was gay?" See, the new series is based loosely on her own life and her TV ex-husband, like her real life ex-husband Peter Marc Jacobson, is gay. Did Fran (real life Fran) really not know?

Oh, kids, not only did she not know she wrote a book (Enter Whining) that all but screamed "MY HUSBAND IS GAY AND I DON'T KNOW IT!!!" on nearly every other page. For example, page four about their jobs in high school:


Peter quit and decided to try his skills at Baskin-Robbins, but he was fired because he was too creative. He use to take the straws out of the wrappers to put them in the whipped cream of an ice cream soda to give it a little style. Some panache. Something to look at.


Happily Divorced opened with Fran (her character's name is Fran also) in bed with husband Peter (John Michael Higgins) where he confesses that he's gay. It's in that scene that the show makes clear it may not recover.

Some people feel uncomfortable watching the show. It's not homophobic and Fran's own reputation for embracing full equality for all is well known. But there's a problem and they can't put their finger on it. Like the character Fran or the actress, they're missing the obvious.

The problem is Higgins.

John Michael Higgins plays shy, retiring types. In fact, "reticent" probably best captures his presence. He can be very good such as in Christopher Guest's classic films A Mighty Wind, Best In Show and For Your Consideration. If he were playing "Mr. Mooney" to Fran's "Lucy Carmichael," it might work. But he's playing Fran's ex-husband whom she's angry with. And he's gay. So her barbs and snap are hitting weak Higgins. What's next? An episode where Fran beats up on the elderly?

It's not that the writers don't give Higgins lines to say. Fran's not continually pelting him with insults. But his energy level is so low and Fran's is so high that their exchanges are uncomfortable.


Since they won't recast the role of Peter, the smartest thing the show can do is start taking the barbs Fran is supposed to hurl at Peter and giving at least half of them to Peter so that he's making comments about himself. That would do so much to fix the show.


All the other elements work. Rita Moreno as Fran's mother (Dori) works -- and we love Rita but who would have thought she could pull off that? Valente Rodriguez is doing a wonderful job as Cesar. And Tichinia Arnold (Everybody Hates Chris, Martin) is everything she needs to be as Fran's best friend Judi. She's everything and more and, in fact, the relationship Judi has with Peter is the sort people need to see between Fran and Peter.


There seems to be some belief that if every script doesn't repeatedly note that Fran and Peter divorced because he's gay, the audience will be confused. But each episode features a theme song that goes over all of this. It's as if every episode of The Nanny had included multiple jokes about Fran working at a bridal shop in Flushing Queens -- forgetting that this had already been covered at the star in the animated opening.

Fran developed this show but hadn't planned to play the lead. If she had cast someone else in the role, we think she would have seen the problem in rehearsals. Instead, she's the actress in the moment and Fran the producer is missing the problem while, we're guessing, Peter Marc Jacobson is too close to the issues to speak up.

The reality is that when the pilot was filmed, the proper move would have been to have reviewed it and come to the conclusion that Higgins wasn't going to work in the role. Truthfully, he's an 80s TV gay man. That is his type. As Peter, he gives off this kind-of-gay-maybe-not-I-can't-tell vibe. Will & Grace imploded that type and gave us Will as leading man and Jack as sexpot. So Higgins playing the a-sexual gay is something of a set-back.

But they didn't make the needed decision. That's too bad because every other element of the show works and we'd love to see a second, third, fourth, fifth season. But when Fran starts again going to the well on how their marriage ended, it's as if they're zooming in for a close up as she's kicking a defenseless puppy to the ground.
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