Tony Medley’s disconcertingly sexist review of Bridesmaids has already been pretty effectively rebutted on Tumblr using gifs alone (or almost alone), but I have thoughts to add. Let me show you them.
The first thing I’d like to say is that “the old-fashioned idea of looking up to women,” or, rather, misguided nostalgia for that idea, kind of makes my skin crawl. It’s one thing not to be a fan of crude humor – which, judging from this review and his general disdain for all of Judd Apatow’s work, I would say Medley is not. It’s another thing to be especially not a fan of it on such an explicitly gendered basis as the one Medley rolls out in this review. I know we’re only talking here about who gets to make poop jokes … but we’re also kind of not. The idea that women shouldn’t have to (or just shouldn’t) participate in certain kinds of humor because it degrades something pristine and special that sets them apart from men isn’t far off, logic-wise, from the idea that women shouldn’t have to worry their pretty little virtuous heads about, I don’t know, say, the dirty and corrupt business of government. It’s the same kind of “angel in the house” bullshit that people (men and women) have used to keep women from voting, earning their own money, and generally participating in public life and being whole human beings for centuries. I feel extremely lucky to live in a time and place where this pernicious off-brand version of “respect” is only being used to attack Melissa McCarthy’s portrayal of a woman shitting in a sink, and not something arguably more important like my right to vote. But that doesn’t mean a lot of the same thinking doesn’t carry over from one to the other, and it doesn’t mean I shouldn’t feel like rolling my eyes when the same condescending ideas get trotted out again in new clothes.
I don’t even know what to say about the fact that Medley apparently considers “woman” and “mother” to be synonyms, and seemingly attributes all of the “respect” that women are due to the fact that they are or could be someone’s mother. (Except that it’s stupid and it sucks.) He talks about placing women on a pedestal (it’s done in “almost every society,” you guys!) like it’s a good thing, even though human history proves over and over again that every society’s favorite part of putting any kind of person on a pedestal is getting to knock them violently off of it the minute they do something wrong.
Speaking implicitly of slut-shaming, let’s look at the creepiest part of Medley’s review. Apparently, the only thing he finds more offensive than women swearing and vomiting is women having sex in more than one position and then talking about it:
“The film starts out with Annie in bed with her apparent boyfriend Ted … offering him sex in any position he wants for however long he wants it. Then, to make matters worse, she talks about it with her best friend, Lillian, going into relatively graphic, uncomfortable, detail.”
Points taken, Tony: It’s the job of good women to say no to incorrigible men (especially in bed), and only perverts talk about sex with their best friends. I’m not completely sure how much offense he’s taking at the characters’ actions themselves versus the degree of detail with which they’re presented, but I don’t really care that much. What disappoints me the most is that Bridesmaids, in its contrasting depictions of Annie’s relationships with Ted and her other love interest Rhodes – not to mention the respective marriages of Becca and Rita, though these characters are very much on the periphery and painted in broader comedic strokes – actually has some interesting things to say about the interplay between self-esteem, romantic commitment, and female sexuality. Sadly, these ideas, as well as the movie’s larger themes of female friendship, class tension, and early midlife crisis, seem lost on Medley, whose pearl-clutching moral myopia means that he can’t see the forest for the dick jokes.
