Indignant is the only way I can describe how I feel tonight.
I am seriously considering never seeing another rated-R movie again. Of my movies, I have three that are rated-R: Legends of the Fall, (which depressed me so much the last time I watched it I may never see it again), Good Will Hunting (which is a terrific movie outside of the gratuitous use of the F-word), and When Harry Met Sally, (which honestly, might be rated PG if it were made today).
To be sure, in light of the movie I saw tonight, all of these movies look like Disney Classics by comparison. A group of seven of us went to see Borat, and the smartest two of us left midway through the movie. Unfortunately, I was not one of the smart two. I spent the drive home wondering if I had missed something in all the reviews I had seen or the people who were talking about it or the commercials I'd seen. Check this page out. I doubt that Citizen Kane enjoyed such rave reviews from critics.
Have we reduced ourselves to such asinine levels that this is "one of the funniest movies ever made?" Is it acceptable that racism, homophobia, sexism, and plain crudeness can be excused under the guise of an ignorant outsider? Further, if you read some of the reviews, they insinuate that a person who doesn't find the jokes funny is really just a closed-minded bigot herself.
Puh-lease. I enjoy laughing at myself as much as the next gal. The fact that I am less than entertained by crass, tasteless humor does not make me closed-minded.
Stef blogged on the issue of moral depravity in movies a couple weeks ago, and I read it without really thinking about it. But I revisited it tonight, and there is an article that she links to that talks about drug addicts often overdosing because they have to take larger and larger doses to get a high. It seems plausible that this is the reason that When Harry Met Sally, which was made in 1989, looks today like a mild PG-13 movie.
With insincere apologies to Mom and Ellen, my evening has been improved by the pleasure of watching Texas lose to K-State as I type. And smirking at the commentators channeling Russ Hodges every time Texas does anything that remotely resembles the actions of a ranked football team.
Oh yeah, when I started researching the candidates I would be voting for on Tuesday, I realized that the Braley/Whalen race that I mentioned in the previous post wasn't even my district. I didn't know whether to be mad that I was subjected to so many low-blow commercials, or to be happy that I wouldn't have to vote for either of the finger-pointing candidates who "approved this message."
Ok, maybe my next post will be happy. I will start thinking positive.....NOW.
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1 comment:
Hey, Betsy,
I can definitely relate to this. After seeing History of Violence a couple of years ago, I decided not to see R-rated movies anymore. I have seen a couple since then, like The Savages, but check them out more than I used to. I've never seen anything as awful as History of Violence. I was so traumatized after seeing it that my friend and I sat at Taco Cabana and made up a plot for a new movie. It was very therapeutic. Our new movie would star Joan Cusack and be about a social worker who learns how to truly build healthy relationships. It was a far cry from Vigo Mortennson doing all the terrible things that his character did in History of Violence. And just so you know, History of Violence got raving reviews, too!
Jennifer
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