29th
I loved The Muppets. LOVED IT. I loved it so much I would marry it (you know, if I didn’t have qualms about the continued validity of marriage as a social institution). I can count on one hand the number of movies Ive seen more than once in theaters in my life, but if someone asked me right now to go see The Muppets again I would cancel whatever other plans I had in order to go. It’s the best comedy of at least the past five years, the most purely fun and enjoyable movie I’ve seen in a very long time, and if I was a member of the Academy with a Best Picture vote I would seriously consider using it on The Muppets. Seriously.
So it pains me to say that I agree with everything Raphael says below. Its a testament to how great this movie is that while I was watching it I found myself thinking “the Amy Adams character is extremely problematic” and “the message conveyed by her storyline is incredibly troubling at best” and yet I didn’t even care or hold it against the filmmakers. But also I do. Because yuck.
Why Hollywood? Why?
I’m so bored of stories about guys who like having fun with their fun friends but then learn a valuable lesson about responsibility from their not fun girlfriends and in the end settle down and mature and become an adult who still gets to have fun with his friends sometimes, but the rest of the time has to be in a boring mature relationship because that’s what grown-ups do.
Because what a bummer that is for the girlfriend, to have to be the responsible one, to have to be the one that actually caresabout their relationship. Because of course she doesn’t have any of her own friends that she likes to have fun with — she’s just a prop for the male character’s development. It’s a trope every bit as stale as the manic pixie dream girl and it’s so boring.
The boy, goof-off sweetheart that he is, forgot the anniversary, or didn’t read the baby books, or took the girl for granted, so busy was he chasing his own dream. And the girlfriend rolls her eyes because, oh, boys will be boys, and it’s all fun and fine as long as they can get married at the end, because of course that’s all the woman really wants.
It’s a weird kind of sexism in the form of flattery— you put the girl on a pedestal, you flatten her out. She’s a passive aggressive wet blanket stick in the mud who instead of chasing her own dream just wants her boyfriend to be a little bit better, when really she should want a better boyfriend.
It’s so super-gross, especially in a kids’ movie, but it doesn’t make me angry, not really. I’m not offended or shocked or outraged when I see movies like The Muppets. I’m just bored. It’s so boring. And I’m so so bored of being so bored.
