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as explained in interviews that she modeled her character on the abrasive loud yet oddly appealing food channel star guy fieri a decision i find brilliant i m going to take for granted that readers of this blog are enlightened enough to be aware of fat phobia unlike the 20 something woman jackass in the theater next to me who squeaked gross at the sight of one of mccarthy s big ankles obviously none of us wants to see a movie that gets cheap laughs from the sight of a fat woman but equally obviously none of us would say that fat women should be kept out of comedies or that they re not allowed to be funny or that they re not allowed to use physical humor silverstein puts it nicely fat women never have fun in films they might laugh but always when people are laughing at them whereas in this one mccarthy s character is having a blast moving forward with that fieri like assuredness that renders impossible a simplistic reading of her character it s important to note that at a crucial moment in the film mccarthy s character steps forward to show a truly heroic self awareness competence sensitivity and dedication to her friends in fact it sounds as if mccarthy herself is responsible for that plot development so i return to the question do i forgive the few bad fat jokes because overall we laugh with mccarthy and appreciate her character so much in the end i remain divided on whether the fat jokes ruin bridesmaids i m still persuaded enough by a silverstein like appreciation for mccarthy s character and performance to refrain from a full throated complaint perhaps this is hollywood s first experiment with enlightened fat phobia pace susan douglas s enlightened sexism that is the film tries to tell us that it s okay to regress back to fat jokes because the fat woman is a successful and comparatively three dimensional character let s face it i laugh at some of those enlightened sexist ads on tv first and foremost the old spice dude who says look again it s an oyster with two tickets to that thing you love that extra layer of irony seems to excuse the fat jokes because they re not the old unenlightened fat jokes it s a fat phobia that seems to accept even celebrate the fat woman on the surface but in reality it repudiates fat people and keeps them in their place as the comic sidekicks maybe posted by didion filed in 2010s films bridesmaids easy a enlightened fat phobia enlightened sexism susan douglas the curious case of women in film the woman problem in the media why feminism matters now tags anna faris annie mumolo bridesmaids enlightened fat phobia enlightened sexism fat jokes fat phobia judd apatow kelsey wallace kirsten wiig kjerstin johnson knocked up maya rudolph melissa mccarthy paul feig rose byrne superbad tad friend the 40 year old virgin wendi mclendon covey 25 comments female rockers times square 1980 14 february 2011 once upon a time a director named allan moyle bought a secondhand sofa and as he was cleaning it he found a diary stuffed into its cushions as he read through it he realized it had been written by a young woman one who d lived on the streets and had probably been emotionally disturbed even though moyle had only directed one film in his career he used the diary to start writing a script and eventually came up with times square there aren t many movies about female rockers but the few that exist have become cult favorites hence starting feminéma s very first cult marathon for movies about female rockers when i say cult movie i don t mean the big budget numbers like last year s the runaways or 2006 s dreamgirls nor do i mean the spice girls movie spice world 1997 or josie and the pussycats 2003 the very term evokes little known movies or films that died at the box office or were critically panned and went undiscovered for a while like ladies and gentlemen the fabulous stains which i wrote about last month thus i m not writing about films that were wrongfully denied prizes on a strictly critical level these films have their problems the pleasure of the cult film comes in other secret subtextual meanings occasionally demanding that we read against the film for the things it implies yet seems to reject times square is just such a movie and for some of those readings and or personal responses to it check out this fanblog defeatedandgifted or this response by the author of the pussyrock fanzine and many thanks to both of them for these great screen caps when i first saw this movie it was a fucking epiphany i was 14 years old hospitalised in a psychiatric unit and just getting into alternative culture times square was a revelation it showed you how exciting and chaotic the big city could be and how it would inspire and stimulate you as well as scare you that was my dream to run away to the bright lights and have my own creative renaissance and be discovered by some cool alternative media svengali it seemed like nicky and pamela represented the 2 halves of my personality and my 2 possible futures this movie seemed like the only thing remotely resembling and evoking my mood and hopes and fears at the time pamela trini alvarado left is the über good girl daughter of the ny city commissioner but being good has left her feeling like a soulless zombie nicky robin johnson right is a street tough with disruptive antisocial tendencies they meet in the mental ward of a hospital being checked out for similar conditions how else can adults explain these girls unwillingness to be normal and happy and despite the differences between them they recognize one another as similar souls so they run away together to live in an abandoned building near the downtown docks at first they focus just on surviving but because of pamela s father s efforts to find her using posters and radio notices that emphasize nicky s mental instability they gradually start to articulate a reaction against the normative world around them those articulations are easier for the educated poetic gentle pamela but they re more explosive from nicky who embraces their new underworld identity as the sleez sisters the film s fame comes from moments like that the girls energizing exuberant defiance of the status quo it also comes from the queer relationship between them which though never explicitly sexualized is clearly the real story of this film in fact the original cut had far more lesbian content due to radical conflicts between the film s producer robert stigwood and director moyle who eventually quit the project in frustration times square was brutally edited and it shows in choppy and nonsensical narrative leaps do any diehard fans out there know whether that cut footage still exists what a great addition it would make to a dvd the only way men matter to the lives of nicky and pamela is as conflicting authority figures pamela s uptight father and at the other end of the spectrum a local radio dj with his own agenda tim curry these girls are primarily dedicated to one another in a way that goes beyond simple friendship and even simple love the most poignant and perfect expression of their bond is a beautifully shot scene in the drydock looking out over the harbor they ve just found it and have decided this ll be their home and they need to adjust to their new style of life nicky tells pamela that if either one of them is ever in trouble they should scream out the other s name for help pammy pammy pammy she screams to demonstrate pamela responds nicky nicky nicky it s the equivalent of one of those male bonding scenes in which two dudes slice open their hands to exchange blood with one another but this is more subversive it signals that these girls might well face sexual violence or attack while living on the street yet screaming together gives them a voice just like we were taught in those self defense classes in college and it makes them giddy and giggly too it s like a spell they cast around them that cements their tie to one another it s specifically a feminine bonding moment based on female danger and a rejection of female victimhood no wonder the film reads so obviously as queer despite the heavy editing watching this film reminds you of the commentators in the amazing documentary the celluloid closet who describe watching certain films over and over and over just to catch that one amazing queer moment no wonder times square was a fucking epiphany the rock punk scenes i m a damn dog now in the above clip and the your daughter is one scene you can find on youtube don t just confirm the girls outsider status but show how that music looked different if it was done by girls and how subversive it might be if they embraced a whole lot of racial and sexual epithets so what if this movie s crazy storyline leaves you scratching your head a bit who ever saw homeless girls with such enviable wardrobes with such a great furnished apartment who so easily get jobs in a topless joint yet don t have to go topless i can be snooty about such things remember my unwillingness to overlook the narrative gaps in easy a but i finished watching it and only wanted to return to certain scenes over and over and over one of the last scenes in which an army of teenage girl fans of the sleez sisters show up wearing the same black mask makeup as nicky didn t make any narrative sense but made me wish the statement would come back even thirty years after the movie s initial release one final note about that army of teenage girl fans there was a similar plot element in ladies and gentlemen the fabulous stains although it was deeply troubling in that later film clearly films of this early 80s generation realized that teenage girls were looking for an outlet a leader someone to articulate their frustration was this how filmmakers addressed the question of feminism as it pertained to a young generation or was it a more ambivalent gesture in susan douglas s terms filmmakers took feminism into account for a brief moment and then ignored it i m left on the fence with only a long list of more cult films about female rockers to help me answer it rock on readers posted by didion filed in 1980s films 2010s films cult movies about female rockers easy a enlightened sexism female ambition ladies and gentlemen the fabulous stains susan douglas the runaways times square women in rock tags allan moyle celluloid closet cult movies about female rockers easy a ladies and gentlemen the fabulous stains robin johnson the runaways times square trini alvarado 7 comments the brainy bunch girls edition 11 december 2010 has anyone else noticed that articles like this one in new york magazine don t get written about young female actors the brainy bunch is about five young men jesse eisenberg michael fassbender james franco joseph gordon levitt and tom hardy who according to the journalist bust a bunch of stereotypes because they play twitchy complicated and most of all brilliant characters the author marvels that these smart actors bring the raw nerve of indie sensibility to the screen moreover in so doing they are reimagining the mainstream articles like this one are inevitably about men not because actresses aren t smart but because they re not playing smart onscreen this has lathered me up into a rant because i think this is yet another example of the exceptionally disturbing moment we re living in during which women s primary value is their hotness not their smartness considering that i grew up in an age when the tomboy smartypants jodie foster was the pre teen it girl a multilingual woman who graduated magna cum laude from yale i m not prepared to let men be smart while women commit their energies to being hot yet i ve been putting some muscle into coming up with a similar list of remarkable young female actors who play smart onscreen and it s really hard not hard for older women mind you as a culture we seem perfectly willing to grant brains to women over 35 witness helen mirren holly hunter tilda swinton charlotte rampling frances mcdormand judy davis the one vivid exeption to the rule is mia wasikowska above she of that remarkable 1st season of in treatment alice in wonderland as the teenaged daughter in the kids are all right and the upcoming jane eyre other than that can you think of a single young actor who plays smart onscreen from one role to the next i can t as much as i loved the fast talking smarts of carey mulligan in an education and emma stone in easy a this year there s one thing that ruins those tales for me ultimately these smart characters are shown to be dumb when it comes to men and sex respectively get it smart girls aren t smart about everything i can think of a couple of one off performances this year jennifer lawrence in winter s bone and noomi rapace in the girl with the dragon tattoo franchise but i have yet to be convinced that these actors can translate one excellent part into the kinds of careers that new york magazine s favorite young men have achieved consider the career of harvard grad natalie portman who s now getting close to 30 and therefore into the age range wherein hollywood allows women to be brilliant has she ever played smart onscreen and don t even get me started on the fact that the last time i saw a smart young latina asian native american or black woman onscreen was shareeka epps in half nelson 2006 and where have the roles gone for epps in the meantime if any of you doubts the perversity of this trend consider one of the prevailing cultural anxieties appearing in major media of the past six months the idea that boys are falling behind girls or in hanna rosin s trademark hysterical terms the end of men at the same time that we watch smart boys and hot girls onscreen we re also supposed to feel anxious about the fact that girls do better in school and young women are going to college in vastly larger numbers than boys they make up roughly 60 of college populations this has prompted rosin and her ilk to proclaim that women are winning some kind of battle against men thus the fact that our films persist in peddling some kind of retro fantasy about boys smartness seems to reject our anxieties that girls might be pretty and smart and reassures us that smart dudes will always bag the hotties if you need an explanation for my bleak mood it s because i just finished reading gary shteyngart s incredibly disturbing dystopian novel super sad true love story in this america of the future women wear clothes made by the juicypussy brand total surrender panties which pop off at the push of a little button and have their hotness level perpetually broadcast to everyone around them via a version of a smartphone called an äpparät it s a brilliant characterization of the future i cringed and laughed at the fact that the hero s love interest eunice park majored in images and minored in assertiveness in college we all know that s where we re heading but ultimately one that reiterates that tired trope shlubby bookish imperfect aging hero falls for very beautiful very young very a...
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