Ebert gives Sex and the City 2 a verbal ass whoopin'

[KillerGremlin]

Linky: http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/...IEWS/100529986

Some of these people make my skin crawl. The characters of "Sex and the City 2" are flyweight bubbleheads living in a world which rarely requires three sentences in a row. Their defining quality is consuming things. They gobble food, fashion, houses, husbands, children, vitamins and freebies. They must plan their wardrobes on the phone, so often do they appear in different basic colors, like the plugs you pound into a Playskool workbench.

Truth in reviewing: I am obliged to report that this film will no doubt be deliriously enjoyed by its fans, for the reasons described above. Male couch potatoes dragged to the film against their will may find some consolation. Reader, I must confess that while attending the sneak preview with its overwhelmingly female audience, I was gob-smacked by the delightful cleavage on display. Do women wear their lowest-cut frocks for each other?

Seriously, totally epic when Ebert gives a movie a complete slam down.

The sad thing is I know one too many vapid bitches who love this show. Even sadder is that I know one too many vapid bitches who actually believe Sex & The City is pro-feminism.

[Xantar]

I know a vapid bitch who says that the Sex and the City TV show was pro-feminism whereas the movies are dumbed down and not pro-feminism. I considered pointing out that the main character's shoe obsession isn't exactly an empowering statement for women, but I was busy arguing with a covert white supremacist (no joke) and decided against it.

I'm glad Roger Ebert doesn't need a jawbone to lay the smack down.

[Professor S]

I heard the pro-feminist arguments as well, but considering the main character was a shallow tart who just so happened to fall in love with the incredibly rich womanizer who treated her like crap most of he time, I have my doubts.

I find the female deluded vision of that show to be further proof that women have no clue about what they really want in this world. Thanks Gloria Steinem. Instead of empowering women, you taught them that feminism wasn't about having the right to pursue freedom as a woman, but instead meant wanting what men had. I don't call that feminism. I call that female masculinity.

And now we have a generation of women who are completely confused, and therefore, a generation of equally confused men.

[KillerGremlin]

Originally Posted by Xantar

I know a vapid bitch who says that the Sex and the City TV show was pro-feminism whereas the movies are dumbed down and not pro-feminism. I considered pointing out that the main character's shoe obsession isn't exactly an empowering statement for women, but I was busy arguing with a covert white supremacist (no joke) and decided against it.

I'm glad Roger Ebert doesn't need a jawbone to lay the smack down.

Yeah...I've seen a few episodes. If the episodes are better than the movie that sets the bar really really low for the film.

Originally Posted by Professor S

And now we have a generation of women who are completely confused, and therefore, a generation of equally confused men.

Sadly, too, since not all feminism is about giving women what men have. The current impact of feminism, and not the idealistic classroom vision but the one that is actually in play at the moment, is muddled and problematic.

But who cares. The moral of the story is that Ebert is el primo when it comes to kicking ass and reviewing movies!

[KillerGremlin]

http://www.movieline.com/2010/05/the...the-city-2.php

1. “SATC2 takes everything that I hold dear as a woman and as a human — working hard, contributing to society, not being an entitled cunt like it’s my job — and rapes it to death with a stiletto that costs more than my car. It is 146 minutes long, which means that I entered the theater in the bloom of youth and emerged with a family of field mice living in my long, white mustache. This is an entirely inappropriate length for what is essentially a home video of gay men playing with giant Barbie dolls.” — Lindy West, The Stranger

http://www.hollywood.com/news/Sexism...e_City/6875338

In the new film Sex and the City 2, heroine Carrie Bradshaw suffers a crippling blow to her ego as she discovers her brand new book – a book about married life and wedding vows – is utterly destroyed by a review in the New Yorker. Distraught, she turns to her three best friends and over drinks it is decided that the reviewer, a man, simply cannot stand the thought of a powerful, liberated woman. Problem solved. No, really. That’s the last we hear of that subplot. It is actually the first of three subplots (out of five total) that are resolved this way in the new film. Men are sexist pigs that are the root of all of our problems. Drink up ladies!

Now, on the surface, I’m fine with this. While it's a terribly unsatisfying way to wrap up a subplot (as well as ultimately serving nothing but reinforcing negative stereotypes), a movie can and will say what it wants. And it’s not like there aren’t actually sexists out there that are, in fact, threatened by powerful, liberated women. Sex and the City brings that ugliness out in droves, filling comment sections with 10-year-old South Park jokes about the age of the women and their appearance. But at the same time, the series (and others like it, like Twilight) also brings out an ugly spate of misandry, as male critics, like myself, are deluged with hate mail, comments and rampant, misdirected sexism stemming from negative reviews of female-tooled entertainment.

Forget, for a moment, that the language in said reviews is exactly the same as that used in reviews of such male-driven lowest common denominator fare as Transformers 2, Tomb Raider or 10,000 B.C., because these commenters often do, even falsely accusing us of defending such insipid fare in order to support and justify their own sexist viewpoints. Even if it wasn’t, how can one justify the sexism inherent in the responses?

The 5-star Amazon reviews for the movie are fucking hilarious too. And even though I have just completed my Minor in Gender and Women's Studies, I'm still a crass son of a bitch so enjoy:

http://sarahjessicaparkerlookslikeahorse.com/

[Xantar]

About feminism: since when was being confused necessarily a bad thing? Better to be confused and seeking a good balance than to be certain with inequality.

[Professor S]

Originally Posted by Xantar

About feminism: since when was being confused necessarily a bad thing? Better to be confused and seeking a good balance than to be certain with inequality.

My issue is not with feminism in theory, but with how the awful Gloria Steinems of the world define it. Feminism should be about women being free to choose the path they wish without external forces preventing them because of their sex. Many feminists believe feminism is defined as women following a traditionally masculine path, not their own path. Now in modern time, I think the main forces applying pressure are from Steinem-like feminism itself.

Let me give you an example:

My wife has always been a working woman. Now we're in the 8th month of pregnancy and she wants to be a stay at home mom (shocks the shit out of me). The problem is she feels very guilty over these feelings and has felt pressure from other women to keep working. The underlying message is that you're not a real woman if you are a stay at home mom; somehow this makes you "less-than".

[Xantar]

You keep talking about Gloria Steinem as if she has any relevance to the world today. She doesn't. Most feminists today respect her accomplishments but think that it's time to move on from her (and we should hope so since her most active period was the 70s). There's a very sizable contingent of female intellectuals, some self-identified as feminists and some not, who are perfectly comfortable with the idea that a woman can be a stay at home mom with her feminist credentials intact. I would go so far as to say these are the vast majority of feminist writers (or gender theorists or whatever else you want to call them) today.

[Professor S]

Originally Posted by Xantar

You keep talking about Gloria Steinem as if she has any relevance to the world today. She doesn't. Most feminists today respect her accomplishments but think that it's time to move on from her (and we should hope so since her most active period was the 70s). There's a very sizable contingent of female intellectuals, some self-identified as feminists and some not, who are perfectly comfortable with the idea that a woman can be a stay at home mom with her feminist credentials intact. I would go so far as to say these are the vast majority of feminist writers (or gender theorists or whatever else you want to call them) today.

Why do you assume I am not aware of other forms of feminism? My comments in this thread are specifically aimed at the Gloria Steinem form, hence my constant reference to her.

As for her relevance, her impact s definitely still felt today, and you can know this just by playing word association with the term "feminism". There is still a lot of pressure put on women to this day to pursue traditionally male roles regardless of what these women actually want from life. That is not feminism, that is female masculinity, and that is rooted in Steinem philosophy.

This is all I've ever stated in this thread, and I never made any global statements about feminism as a whole.

[KillerGremlin]

Originally Posted by Professor S

Why do you assume I am not aware of other forms of feminism? My comments in this thread are specifically aimed at the Gloria Steinem form, hence my constant reference to her.

As for her relevance, her impact s definitely still felt today, and you can know this just by playing word association with the term "feminism". There is still a lot of pressure put on women to this day to pursue traditionally male roles regardless of what these women actually want from life. That is not feminism, that is female masculinity, and that is rooted in Steinem philosophy.

This is all I've ever stated in this thread, and I never made any global statements about feminism as a whole.

I like women that pursue traditionally male roles. We have the lingerie football league. If that isn't liberating I don't know what is.

[FuzzTop]

Originally Posted by KillerGremlin

I like women that pursue traditionally male roles. We have the lingerie football league. If that isn't liberating I don't know what is.

naked mud wrestling? naked news?

[incredibledave]

Hmmm, while I know Ebert is a well respected critic and this movie is probably god awful, I felt his review of Kick-Ass to have missed the point entirely.

So maybe hes wrong again, and this movie is solid gold?