And that one of the old stereotypes used by those against women-in-combat was “it’s just the lesbians who are interested anyway”, so in-universe, in-time-period creating that rumor would be politically seen as “harming the cause” of women’s inclusion so better back off before it spreads. One may retort that then the characters are engaging in “Straight Middle Class White Woman Feminism” and I do suppose from the 17-years-later perspective we may expect that whosoever is shown fighting one gender injustice, should be fighting them ALL – but that was not what that movie was made for.
OTOH, we *do* have Kiddie Beauty Pageants in *our* day and age...
Not the biggest WTF, but the Genesis song and video "Illegal Alien"from 1984 is, nevertheless, out there. From Phil Collins’ mock Mexican accent to the use of cliche after cliche, combined with the stanza where Phil’s character is willing to prostitute his sister to get across the border, seeing one of the least ethnic bands ever doing this rates a WTF.
The bad part is that the actor who played Ben, Fisher Stevens, is actually not a bad guy. Since I’m assuming that his lack of comment regarding what were the highest profile roles of his career (Short Circuit and Short Circuit 2) means he feel contrition about his actions, I’d lay the blame for this directly at the feet of the director, the casting agents and the studio which released these duds.
In “Sign of the Cross,” a 1933 Cecil DeMille Christian epic, there was something called the “Bride of the Gorilla” scene in which a scantily clad (for the times) woman is chained to a pillar and approached by a gorilla. The scene cuts away to a horrified audience reaction before the gorilla can so much as touch her, but given that the scene was labelled “Bride of the Gorilla” in some credits, it’s pretty easy to figure what was intended. Especially since I did a little research and discovered that 1931, there was “Ingagi,” which involved women given to a gorilla to serve as sex slaves, and in 1937 there was “Love Life of A Gorilla.” Also “Angkor” from 1937 which moved the woman and gorilla sex theme to Asia.
I had no fucking idea that bestiality was getting that much “play” during the Hayes Code Era, so I said, as you might expect, “WTF?”
It’s even more WTF? than that. Very few people had seen a gorilla in 1931 (pre-code), and a lot of people believed what I guess was a sort of UL that they were actually a race of strong, hairy humans. Considering that most white people in the US in 1931 thought black Africans were something fundamentally different from white people, and more bestial, the idea that apes were just hairy types of Africans made sense to some people. The actresses in Inagi were white women in blackface, or it might be the original blaxploitation movie.
It did inspire* King Kong*, which then inspired the rest of those films, so no, it really wasn’t about bestiality, as much as a meme that got thoroughly played out in no time flat. By 1949, a twist on the gorilla movie was the pretty girl in charge of the giant ape, instead of being vulnerable to him.
FWIW, in 1931, most people’s reaction to Inagi was WTF?
Reminds me of one of my own WTF moments: a couple years back I’m watching “Meet Me In St. Louis” for the first time. Part of the plot involves a minor domestic crisis when the daughter (Judy Garland) can’t go to a society dance because her boyfriend lost his tux and he doesn’t have anything else appropriate to wear. Cue the kindly old grandfather, who steps forward and says, “Don’t worry - I have a tuxedo in a trunk upstairs!”
Ah, that’s nice - gramps is gonna lend Judy’s boyfriend his old tux so they can go to the dance together.
Er, nope! Turns out gramps wants to wear the tux HIMSELF and be his granddaughter’s date to the ball. This must be a clever plot twist, right? Now Judy has to figure out how to gently break it to the old man that she really wants to go with her boyfriend?
Nope! Judy and everyone else is delighted with the solution and they go off and have a merry time.
WTF?
Is the asexual black supporting character some kind of film archetype? I haven’t noticed this. Except for the notorious lack of a romance between Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts in “The Pelican Brief,” though he was a leading character, not a supporting player.
Yeah. Mixed race couples are ubiquitous in bigger cities, and there are so many biracial people over the age of 18 now, that having everyone paired off by color is starting to look weird on TV and in the movies. Especially when two other people seem like a better match, but they would require a mixed race coupling.
That performance would be WTF even if it were done by a Japanese actor. A Japanese actor in fake buck teeth. That film came out in '61, not '41.
BTW, what was up with the buck-toothed stereotype? I know lots of people who had buck-teeth as kids (I did, until I had braces), but not one was Japanese, or for that matter, Chinese. Was there was WWII general with buck teeth, or something? Hirohito had crooked teeth, but they weren’t buck teeth, and they weren’t unusual for the 1940s.
I also have to wonder if the song “Funny Face” is the inspiration for “The Most Beautiful Girl in the Room”. The winner for most backhand compliment is…
They were actively looking for an excuse to throw her out. “They” didn’t question it because “they” were the ones who were having the pictures taken and making the aspersions.
That it was stupid and obvious that it was stupid was the point.
Another point against “Jane” is the fact that they were planning to use her as a media darling. They couldn’t use her hat way if there was the barest hint of impropriety.
I liked the movie, in sort of a light, popcorn movie kind of way.
I think a lot of it did come from caricatures of Hirohito and especially Tojo, which morphed into a generalizedracialcaricature, at least for certain generations. And yeah, that last one is by Dr. Seuss. =/
I watched Blue Hawaii recently and a couple of things stood out. It had a fairly brutal Asian stereotype - Angela Landsbury’s butler, who made lots of silly pratfalls and generally acted incompetent. His character’s name? Ping Pong.
But my favorite part was right at the beginning. Elvis has just flown back from the Army, and his girlfriend goes to pick him up, only to see him making out with the Stewardess. Turns out he was doing that to get a rise out of her. Then she asks him if he was faithful to her, and Elvis sings this song, which really has to be seen to be believed.
Oh, come on! Only in these messed up times would there be a problem with this. Bing is humouring a youngster - no question of anything odd about it. He’s after Grace Kelly - you can say he’s too old for her (53 to 27) but that’s a different matter!
I thought this was especially blatant in the Dungeons & Dragons movie in which they paired off the human thief with the elven ranger – because they were both black. Elves and humans? Why the hell not? Blacks and whites? Not in my dungeon!
This was especially disappointing for me at the end of the Tenth Doctor’s time, when we found that previously-mixed-race-coupled Mickey and previously-mixed-species-desirous Martha had been paired off.
At least Donna was consistent in her attraction to black men, even after having been badly mistreated by one.
Except for the notorious lack of a romance between Denzel Washington and Julia Roberts in “The Pelican Brief,” though he was a leading character, not a supporting player.
