By the way, i liked Huckleberry Finn. And it was certainly a progressive book for its time. But it’s a book by and for white people. If a black person told me they didn’t want to read a book where the only black character is basically there for the moral development of a white boy, where all the important decisions are made by that white boy, including ones that are really important in the life of the black man, and where the white boy spends most of the book feeling guilty for thinking of the black man as a person and not as property… You know, i wouldn’t criticize that black man.
Oh, Granny Hawkins…
You’re not using the right search criteria. If you want, I’ll send you some key words.
One of them ain’t Reckon.
Again, if someone does not want to read a book or watch a movie or see some play they need not give any reason. Totally up to them.
If they want to criticize those works then they should probably have consumed that art (read/watch/etc.)
And when talking about older works like the “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” I think it is important to note if it is being judged as if were written yesterday or if it was written 140 years ago.
I don’t care about no stinkin’ generation gap. I say I’m old enough to know better.
And when some of these young women radicals grow up they’ll learn this “pornography and sex work is fine as long as women are respected” bullshit is not true.
They’ll realize pornography is bad, demeaning and degrading to all females.
And maybe men will quit mansplaining how it’s all just the little woman’s view that’s messed up.
So any disagreement is “mansplaining”?
You are aware that it is not just women who perform in porn?
A) there is plenty of sex-positive female porn, made by women who do not share your concerns.
B) there is plenty of porn involving men only, and while much of that may be bad, demeaning and degrading to the males involved (which I do not support) there exists exploitation across all genders.
“Male gaze” doesn’t just mean "titillating " to me. Its more like “assumes a male audience”. That can include a focus on women’s anatomy, like when an author describes a waitress as like “she was stout and middle aged, her uniform shirt stretch across breasts that had probably been her pride and joy in her youth” or something stupid like that.
But it can also just be focusing on the things that a male audience would care about. I mean, I think most of us have a pretend audience in our heads when we write. I have one right now, writing this. Sometimes, male creators seem to be imagining only men watching. Thats why the Bechdal test joke is so intriguing to women: it seems to illustrate that male creators really don’t think there’s anything of interest regarding women unless and until a man is somehow involved.
I do wonder if they’ll start geezersplaining to young women why their thoughtful, considered opinions are untrue.
See, now this is a discussion worth having. We stand a better chance of understanding Poor Things by looking at the themes it has in common with Lanthimos’s earlier films. (Of those, I’ve seen only Dogtooth and The Lobster.)
That seems to be the order of the day in general. It’s very difficult to engage in a civilized debate where an exchange of ideas can be beneficial to all parties concerned. Instead, it’s often a war where you entirely agree or you are an idiot. There is very little “in between”. This place is very special because it is set up to stop that and encourage civilized discourse.
I apologize for “geezersplain.” That’s clunky and offensive. I’m gonna go with “gransplaining” from now on.
Yeah, this alternate language is sometimes called “algospeak” for this reason. I don’t know how old “unalive” is, but I believe it first came about on TikTok to get around filters of the word “suicide” and then “kill.” “SA” for “sexual assault.” I’ve heard YouTube commentators use the word “pewpew” for “gun.” “Corn” for “porn” (often with just the emoji.) “Seggs” for “sex.” “Grape” for “rape.” Apparently “mascara” was/is also a code for sexual assault on TikTok, but that one I’ve not come across in the wild. All the other ones I’ve heard over the last year or so (and most just in the last day or two.) I’ve even heard “p3do” (“pedo”) pronounced as “pee three dee oh” the other day on a YouTube short. I don’t know if that was just that particular YouTubers quirk.
And, from what I can tell, many of these euphemisms aren’t even necessary as many/most algorithms don’t actually ban them, but it seems to have developed into it’ own kind of code language a la leetspeak. Pretty interesting, I find, though I sometimes think the word choice could be better.
Funny enough this movie fails the inverse Bechdal test.
I created the thread hoping some more familiar with his work would help parse those themes out …
The movie was very weird but I don’t think weird for weird’s sake.
FWIW:
This is not evidence of anything but the people I saw “Poor Things” with had also seen “The Lobster” and both easily agreed “Poor Things” was way more weird. Which I guess meant “The Lobster” was weird but this went to an even more weird place.
Annoying I find. If it is needed to communicate on another platform then fine but it is not needed here. No reason to not use normal language rather than make us learn some new codespeak.
But if they DO choose to explain why they don’t want to watch it, others shouldn’t jump on them and attack them for reasoned and reasonable choices.
Saying “i don’t want to watch this, and this is why” is
- not attacking the work
- not attacking people who like the work
- a useful form of criticism for other people who might have similar concerns as you have. It is part of a full and constructive discussion of the work.
Oh, I’m not commenting on its use here—it’s not necessary, I agree. Just explaining and observing the greater context of those words/abbreviations.
Ah, yes, because sex is bad, women who like sex are bad, sex is inherently defiling to women, and none of those ideas were created by the Patriarchy to stop “their” women from sleeping around.
Clearly the only path towards female empowerment is embracing puritanical views on sex.
This is important to consider. Huck Finn is not some trivial movie, it has great historical and literary value, but at the same time the story is not going to seem attractive or entertaining to all readers. Even the historical value and literary groundbreaking style can be studied without reading the entire story from start to finish.
People can dislike genres, specific content, particular actors or directors, writers, even characters. I don’t know how many heist movies have been made, undoubtedly many more will be, and I don’t want to watch any more of them because the vast majority of them are essentially the same and any the break out of the existing mold will be noted for doing so with specifics that might get me to watch one. However, it will take something very different and original if I don’t lump it in with all the rest. I’ve seen several that claimed to offer something unique and they didn’t, so it’s much less likely i will ever see another one. I don’t have to know the details to say “I don’t like heist movies, they are all the same.” Yes, there are outliers worth watching perhaps, but since I can’t think of one of those in particular further supports the idea that I shouldn’t bother watching any more of them.
The more I hear about it the more I get that there would be identifiable “issues” with the film. Was listening to one of Stone’s interviews and it left me me like, uh huh, so what’s so great about it as opposed to anything else?
There have been other blank-slate-mind stories written and filmed, and other liberation-through-disregard-of-sex-norms stories too and it looks like a crapshoot whether they come out intriguing or cringe (siddown Heinlein, I see you over there). So no surprise it happens here. Too easy to wind up with something that comes across as per OP.
It has been mentioned, the director may have a reputation for “this film will make you uncomfortable and we meant it to” works, so there’s that too. Though “we disturbed you on purpose” does not necessarily mean it’s wrong for you to be upset and prefer to not experience it.
…
(On the Barbie sidetrack: wait, wait, so we were supposed to look for a serious feminist/patriarchal-critical analysis? Not just a fun parody thereof? )