On 'Bridesmaids': Am I Doing Being A Woman Wrong?
I'm a little disturbed by how quickly and cynically you dismissed the "women speaking exclusively to each other" requirement of the Bechdel Test, which is merely a framework that points out the tremendous gender disparities in stories written for the screen. How suspicious and particular does one have to be to believe that merely having women in all the leading roles is not "female enough," to basically implicitly accuse them of being puppets on strings?
And to do it in the same breath while building insidious sexist straw-men out of what seem like innocent and (gasp!) positive movie reviews, as you said: "Eek."
I also think it's an unhelpful misreading of the movie to suggest that the spectre of the "male realm" of marriage haunts this movie. To say that is to take our outdated WWII era ideas about marriage and just slap them onto this movie without so much as the admission that the idea of marriage has changed since The Women came out (the original, not the remake). As if people in their 30s don't spend plenty of time going to their friends' weddings: why not just see the premise as the commonly-understood backdrop it is? The movie may be being marketed as an ensemble comedy, but this movie is really about Kristen Wiig's character, who is at sea for plenty of complex reasons, not simply because she doesn't have a man. What, are we not allowed to have women fall in love in movies now because it seems like a man is solving their problems?
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On 'Bridesmaids': Am I Doing Being A Woman Wrong?
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On Bolt Bus v. Fung Wah: Which Cheap Bus To Boston Is Least Annoying?
My friends and I were both headed up to Boston and left at the same time: the two of them on a 11am Bolt Bus, and me on an 11am Fung Wah. I got into South Station at 2:30pm and they rolled in at 4:15. The Bolt Bus is so slow leaving Manhattan. That plus my knee-jerk hatred of anything people get too excited about ("OMG BOLT BUS RULEZ CHINATOWN BUSES ARE SCARY!!11") equals me always staying loyal to Fung Wah for the rest of time.
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On Elizabeth Taylor, As We Remember Her
I was hoping this would be a clip of the White Diamonds ad, because I unironically love that ad.
Get ready for the most incredible month on Turner Classic Movies ever.
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On 'Bridesmaids': Am I Doing Being A Woman Wrong?
@Shane Truax@facebook I do appreciate your point about how the author applied the Bechdel test, you're right, but I don't really think it's necessary to think of the pursuit of love as gendered. If Hollywood said to me, "all women want is a mate," I'd say, bullsh*t, but if Hollywood said to me, "all anybody wants is love," to me, that's harmless. I mean, heck, the civil rights issue of our decade revolves around the right to get married, around love! It's in this context this movie has been made, a context that specifically suggests love/partnership transcends gender. To apply an old construct that men are narratively "fixing" women at the end of movies with relationships, I think, is a mistake, if only when it comes to this movie.