I hate guy movies. The abhor, loathe, despise kind of hate. I want to punch guy movies in the face, ever since we teenage girls lost our boyfriends to the nth rec room viewing of Porky’s. And that’s not jealousy talking, don’t go there. It’s driven by the fear that, throughout their lifetimes, our future-men are being lulled (with promises of vicariously experiencing alcohol, drugs and boobies) into becoming stupid. And, with some, it seems scarily easy. I hated The Hangover and firmly believe anything starring Will Ferrell, Ben Stiller, John Cho or Kal Penn will be the indirect cause of the Western downfall. All we can do is hope the Coens will save us.
Moving on.
September 2011: there’s been a lot of hype about this movie called Bridesmaids. While I admit to possessing a certain (see: consummate) degree of film elitism, every once in a while an obvious made-for-chicks flick comes along that seems worth checking out. So I did.
Shock. I never, ever imagined the copulation/fart/vomit/poop gags made famous by guy movies could ever successfully cross into girl territory, though I’ve known since I was a teen that we of the gentler, weaker sex spend many a pyjama-clad hour giggling over same (and worse) with our girlfriends. I mean, the first minute and a half alone must have had the female population of the test audience all eyeing each other with that ‘I know, right?’ look on their faces. And when the squint-eyed Kristen Wiig says, “I’m trying to make it round, but I can’t ‘cuz I have elbows,” I think my juice came out my nose a little bit.
Bridesmaids is over the top, it’s true. The characters are caricatures. There’s the every-woman, the best friend, the princess, the butchy straight girl, the good girl, and the angry housewife. No surprises there. There are characters I question the need for (her mother, the roommates). The storyline and its subplots are as overdone as they come, jealousy over new best friends, trying to find love in all the wrong places, not recognizing the real thing when it comes along, realizing everyone has their own heartache, blah blah blah. But that’s not what we’re watching for. It’s the gaffes, the hand-over-the-mouth delight in being mortified at someone else’s (sometimes) extreme discomfort. These, my dears, are fantastic.
I’ve crossed over to the Dark Side. And if anything like this graces screens in the future, I might just do it again.
If you have a penchant for the bawdy and irreverent done well, and can handle witnessing the fallout of a bad Brazilian meal, Bridesmaids is worth a look.
It’s something old, something new, something borrowed and (cough) something very, very blue. ~ David Edwards, Daily Mirror (UK)
Erin's Clishmaclaver 