Women Can Be Funny

Women aren't funny, that's what I'm told.  I'm not sure when that became the popular sentiment but it seems to be viewed as common knowledge.  I have very recently watched Bridesmaids, a movie that is currently the highest grossing female comedy beating out Sex and the City (ugh).  That right there is a reason women are universally panned as being not funny, they enjoy Sex and the City, also they think Sarah Jessica Parker is beautiful.

I'll be honest, I really enjoyed Bridesmaids and not as a movie where women are funny but as a comedy.  It had its slow moments but it is rare to find any movie that is brings it from start to finish.  What I will say is that I liked this movie, I'm not going to run out and buy it on bluray but I'll be damned if I'd say it didn't make me laugh. I said as much on Facebook last night and received a few comments to the contrary and it got me thinking about this idea that women aren't funny.

It is true that you rarely see a woman in comedy that isn't meant to just stand there as an object of lust for one of our male protagonists or is clutching her pearls in horror at the hijinks that are being laid out before her.  I'm also reminded of the term "the hole" that I first heard while listening to O&A to describe the woman on a radio show who's job it is to say "oh that's not nice" or "stop that" whilst laughing at something crude being said by the men on the show. 

Won't somebody think of the children?

I argue that women can be funny, sadly my first example was born in 1926 but that doesn't make her less funny or my example any less valid.  Cloris Leachman was a staple of some of Mel Brooks' finest movies.  If you've seen her in Young Frankenstein as Frau Blucher (neigh) or most recently as Maw Maw in Raising Hope you'd have to agree that she is one funny lady.  Never afraid to reach the absurd or ugly herself up, she was a woman that could hang with the boys.

He vas my boyfriend!

I can continue on with examples of women that I personally feel are funny like Madeline Kahn, Amy Sedaris, Tiny Fey, Kerri Kenney, Wendi McLendon-Covey, Jane Curtin, Catherine O'Hara, Jane Lynch, etc.  but what would that prove?  If anything it proves that for every woman I can name there are probably 5 men that I can add. Maybe it isn't that women aren't funny but rather they aren't asked to be. 

I think most women would rather be told they're beautiful than told they're funny.  A woman would rather walk into a room and be longed after rather than laughed at.  Is that true?  Perhaps to a point, and maybe that's the problem. 

Parody Movies Aren't Dead...Yet

I want to say parody movies are dead, but instead I'll be optimistic and say they're on life support.  Last night I watched Spaceballs with my wife, this was her first time seeing the movie.  It had been awhile since I had seen the movie but I still knew every line and still laughed at every punch line.  I realized that I was even laughing at things I had not laughed at previously because I've gotten older and only now got some of the jokes that were previously over my head. 

Spaceballs holds up, as does every other Mel Brooks movie, with maybe the exception being Dracula: Dead & Loving It, but even that is better than the crop of dreck that calls itself parody movies.  The writing duo of Aaron Seltzer and Jason Friedberg have lobotomized the comedy art form that Mel Brooks made famous.  I couldn't help but think that in the hands of Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer a Star Wars parody would most assuredly turn Yoda into Yo'Dawg and had the character played by Tracy Morgan.

Rather than create a top 5 worst list of movies these two have "written" because to be honest none of them are good enough to be numbers 2-5, I thought I'd point out what is wrong with all of them. I have not seen them all but much like you didn't need to know Hitler to know he was a bad man, you don't need to see these movies to know they're awful.

These two modern day Shakespeare's are responsible for Date Movie, Epic Movie, Disaster Movie, Vampires Suck, Meet the Spartans & The Biggest Movie of All Time 3D.  The premise of all of these movies is to take whatever is relevant right now...right now not three seconds ago but right now at this very minute that they're writing the movie and put that into the movie.  They will shoe horn it into a movie if they have to.

Britney Spears shaving her head is still super relevant and funny, right?

The scene above is from Meet the Spartans where our dynamic writing duo took the short scene from 300 where King Leonidas kicks the Persian messenger into a pit and dragged it on for so long just so they could incorporate a super timely Britney Spears reference as well as the American Idol judges. 

Rather than continue to show examples of the awful shoe horned pop culture references that litter their movies I'd like to instead provide just one example of why Mel Brooks is a genius and these two are putzes.  My example is the comedic masterpiece High Anxiety, which is a take on Vertigo and many other Hitchcock films.

It's not always good to be the King

Dr. Richard Thorndyke suffers from High Anxiety due to a trauma at a very young age.  In his attempt to help a beautiful young woman rescue her father from the "Psychoneurotic Institute for the Very, VERY Nervous" where he is the new administrator.  In an homage to The Birds Dr. Thorndyke is attacked by pigeons that shit all over him.  In a nod to Psycho he is attacked by a bell hop in the shower with a newspaper, we see the ink slowly slip down the drain.  In a scene that might have nothing to do with anything the good Dr. is attacked while making a phone call in a phone booth and his heavy breathing and struggle to live is mistaken for a dirty phone call by Madeline Kahn.  I could go on but I won't.

The point in all this is that we are in desperate need of smart comedies and parodies.  We have allowed ourselves to be fed the awful spoofs and Movie that the dynamic duds have thrown at us.  We should be demanding more from our entertainment and from Hollywood. 

I do believe the next blog I write will be devoted entirely to Mel Brooks movies, perhaps a top 5 list of my favorites.  He is one of my favorite directors which should come as no surprise considering we're both non practicing Jews from Brooklyn with a thing for Italian women.

Batman & Robin or: Why Did I Sit Down to Watch This?

A few days ago I got the urge to watch Batman & Robin again, the 1997 movie directed by Joel Schumacher and starring George Clooney.  The last time I had seen the movie was when it came out, don't judge me I was 15 years old at the time and I didn't know that it was going to be that bad.  Maybe a year ago I stumbled upon a four pack for under $10 at Costco of the Batman movies, it included: Batman, Batman Returns, Batman Forever and Batman & Robin. 

I came to the conclusion that if I was going to subject myself to this terrible movie a second time that at the very least I would get a blog out of it.  I decided I'd try to find things that others have not yet found in the movie, nuggets of awfulness or surprising bright spots.  I set out to write a pros versus cons list for the movie that killed that Batman franchise.  There were no pros so instead here are 5 cons.

#1 Campy without being fun
There is nothing wrong with setting out to make a campy movie, I love the Adam West Batman.  The problem they ran into here is that it was campy without any of the fun that the 1966 movie and 60s TV show brought to the table 

Never leave the cave without it

When Batman pulls out his GothCard with its expiration date of FOREVER I'm assuming the audience was supposed to get a good chuckle out of it.  That bit of awfulness is actually overshadowed by the various cartoon sounds that accompany nearly every fight scene.

#2 Mr. Freeze
I know it has been mentioned before but it is too glaring not to point out.  I'm fairly certain not a single line is uttered by Mr. Freeze that is not a pun.  Not one. 

Freeze! Chill! Cool out! Ice to see you!

Read the script, re-watch the movie, I swear to you not a single line uttered by Mr. Freeze did not contain a terrible pun that would've made Burt Ward roll his eyes.

Holy shitty writing Batman!

#3 Uma Thurman
Above I pointed to Mr. Freeze as being terrible but not Arnold and the reason for that is because Arnold doesn't really act in any movie he has been in.  All of his characters sound the same because apparently decades in the United States can't do away with that thick Austrian accent.  The moment Uma Thurman becomes Poison Ivy she talks like someone doing a bad impression of what women in the 1930s talked like. 

#4 The Story
Alfred is sick, oh and by the way he has a niece that is stopping by and we are going to take the Barbara Gordon we all know and love and make her his niece thus removing the need to have to come up with an interesting way to introduce this new character.

Be sure to buy the action figure though

Alfred has a made up disease that is the same disease that Mr. Freeze's wife has.  The cure has something to do with needing diamonds, which is also the same thing he needs to power his suit, which makes it a really fucking expensive suit to operate.  Meanwhile, Poison Ivy is angry because blah blah blah plants, mother earth, blah blah blah, who cares really because they don't really tell you why.

Somewhere along the way Batman, Robin & Batgirl all learn to trust, love, care for, fight alongside one another and save the day.  The story is so bad and so non-existent I literally watched the movie no more than 30 minutes ago and am having an issue explaining it now here.

#5 Ice Skates
Very beginning of the movie the dynamic duo go to stop Mr. Freeze, when they first leave they do not know that shit is going down, they do not know that Mr. Freeze even exists.  They get into a scuffle with the frosty Austrian and decide it is time to even the scales in this fight.

They just clicked their fucking heels together

Are these a standard feature in the suits?  How would that even work?  Who came up with this and have they been properly punished?

Hopefully the pain I endured re-watching this movie has brought you a modicum of joy while reading this blog.  If you do feel the urge to watch Batman & Robin I suggest you ingest lye instead.  Or just watch any of the other Batman movies, I suggest the Adam West movie for some good campy fun. 

Keep these on you just in case

5 Teams I'd rather see in the Super Bowl

Today is Super Bowl Sunday and I couldn't be more uninterested.  If you know me then you know it isn't because I dislike football but rather due to the two teams playing this year for the Lombardi Trophy.  The New York Giants have appeared in 4 Super Bowls and have won 3 of them, today will be their 5th appearance.  The New England Patriots have appeared in 6 Super Bowls and won 3 of them, today will be their 7th appearance.  As far as I can tell their is no underdog in this fight, no lovable loser finally trying to attain greatness.  That is why I present to you my list of 5 teams I would rather see play in and win a Super Bowl.


#1

New York Jets

This choice is a totally biased choice.  For those of you who know me I'm a die hard Jets fan and for those of you who don't know me...well now you know I'm a die hard Jets fan.  Through bad times and worse, through sickness and death...I'm a Jets fan.  The Jets have appeared in and won exactly 1 Super Bowl in their existence and that was way back in 1969 in Super Bowl III.  43 years have passed since then and we are getting to the point where fans would gladly donate a testicle or two to get them back to the big game.





#2

Detroit Lions

Fans of this franchise would probably dismiss my complaining over 1 Super Bowl appearance and win for the mere fact that they've never even played in the big game.  The Lions have not won a thing since 1957 back before the NFL/AFL merger.  They are also the only team to have ever gone an entire season without recording a win.  If any team deserves a chance to sniff a Super Bowl it is this group of losers, and so long as they aren't there playing against my Jets, I'll be pulling for them.


#3

Cleveland Browns

The Cleveland Browns have the ugliest uniforms in the NFL, but that isn't really the only reason I have them on this list.  The poor Browns have never sniffed a Super Bowl after being one of the more successful teams prior to the NFL/AFL merger.  And if that isn't bad enough, after 50 years in Cleveland their owner moved them to Baltimore where they became the Baltimore Ravens and won the Super Bowl a short 4 years after the move. 



#4

Arizona Cardlinals

The Cardinals made the Super Bowl back in 2009 but that was their one and only trip to the big game.  The team was established in 1898(!) and became a charter member of the NFL in 1920.  They haven't won a title since 1947, which was a 62 year drought between playing in a championship game.  Here's hoping that they don't have to wait for another supermarket bag boy before they see their next Super Bowl.



#5

Cincinnati Bengals

The Bengals have been to 2 Super Bowls and had to deal with the dynasty that was the Montana led 49ers.  If the Bengals teams of the 80s didn't come up against Joe Montana we might be talking about the Bengals dynasty of the 80s.  Their best years are marred by the fact that they just happened to be playing great football while other teams were playing legendary football.  




Enjoy the game today!