My review of THE STEPFORD WIVES (2004)
Spoilers? How could I possibly spoil a film that so expertly spoiled itself?
How can you say that this movie was based upon Ira Levin's book? More like "sewn together from the mutilated body parts of its corpse."
Fifteen minutes into the film, I was already mentally writing my review:
E.
vis.
cer.
ated.
...This movie eviscerated the excellent book that it was based upon, as well as the competent adaptation from 1975 (which seems even more competent in comparison).
I wondered beforehand how an updated remake would be handled. The original book and movie are quite dated. They're set at the moment in history where the American Women's Liberation movement is hitting its peak. A pivotal moment in the book has to do with realizing that there was a strong chapter of NOW in Stepford that has entirely disappeared. How would the new movie choose to portray feminism in the first decade of the 2000's?
Well, in the new version, the evil mastermind behind it all turns out to be... Martha Stewart. Yes, that's right. The male mastermind behind the Men's Association turns out to be a robot himself, created by his wife. She's a brilliant neurosurgeon, who longs for the "perfection" of the 1950's. So, in essence, if we are to take this social satire at all seriously, the Barbie-fication of women in contemporary society is to be blamed upon their foremothers from the 50's. That's quite a revision from the original!
There has always been some argument about whether the original Stepford Wives was itself misogynist, or instead an anti-sexist allegory about the-evil-that-men-do. Personally, I think it's pretty clear that Ira Levin's sensibilities where feminist in nature, and the misogyny in the story is meant to be read as a horrible thing...
In my opinion, the new film thinks that it is being anti-sexist, but fails. The new film IS misogynist in many respects. My inner warning alarms started going off in the very first scene of the movie. Joanne (Nicole Kidman), who runs a TV network, is delivering a speech to an auditorium when a disgruntled male contestant from one of her shows interupts. After some back and forth, he shouts "I have an idea: kill all women!"
If this were a dark prelude to the the murderous intentions of the Men's Association, the producers of Stepford Wives might have been able to justify this scene. But instead, it seems to be meant to be humorous. NOT funny. Does anyone else remember the Montreal Massacre? Where a male college student who was angry at his former partner decided to go on a shooting spree, targeting specifically women at his school? What I know of Canadian culture and how it responded to that event leads me to think that this scene won't be being laughed at north of the border.
Soon after, Mathew Broderick (Joanne's husband) more or less tells Kidman that the attack was justified. He spouts off lines about how all women who wear black are "castrating bitches". He tells Kidman that she's become the sort of woman who inspires people to kill her. ...Are these comments meant to show the seed of evil in Broderick that will later lead to him killing his wife? No! Broderick is the good and honest husband, a sympathetic character in this movie, and what we've seen of Kidman previously leads the viewer to think that these statements are supposed to be true ones, serious commentary on what career-minded women have become in modern society.
The underlying message of the new Stepford Wives, gender-wise, is that "Both men and women can be horrible people. The solution is somewhere in the middle." But oddly enough, the movie's main message may not even be about gender. Why do men and women become horrible people? Because they long for impossible perfection, apparently -- either from their partners, or from themselves (if they're women).
So, condensing those messages once again, what we're being told is that (A) both men and women can be sexist, and (B) the root of sexism is wishing for an impossible perfection.
* * * * *
I gotta address this "both men and women can be sexist" notion. First off, I validate the notion that women can be bigotted toward men. It is a wrong that is worth talking about. However, I have NEVER heard someone talk about women's prejudice against men in a way that satisfies me. Women's prejudice toward men, and men's prejudice toward women, are not mirror images of each other. There's a dialectic: statements such as "men are pigs" have evolved over decades in response to a history of women being treated as men's property that lasted for at least hundreds of years...
That doesn't mean that men's prejudice is "worse", and that women's should just be ignored. There's a danger in referencing history, that it will be used to perpetually excuse the bad behavior of women in the present. To some extent, actions do have to have to be judged on their own merit, in the present. ...But what I hear underlying most criticisms of women's prejudice is "See? Women can be just as bad as men!" It sounds to me like men making excuses: if you're just as dirty as we are, then we're off the hook.
What I want to hear is complicated. What men has done is wrong, and men need to take responsibility for being different. The historical reasons why women's bigotry has evolved as it has need to be acknowledged. And women should strive for a higher standard. There's room for some grousing; but any emerging culture of slander-as-empowerment should be cut off at the root. Preferably by women themselves. But if men are compelled to condemn bigotry on the part of women, then it should be grounded in a clear sense of what ideals men should also be striving for simultaneously.
See, part of what has ennobled feminist criticisms of men has been a basically humanist vision that we could ALL be better. Men feeling motivated to criticize women "because women started it" is unworthy.
* * * * *
So, back to the movie. How is it misogynist? It is misogynist because despite delusions of criticising men AND women's sexism even-handedly, it merely slanders both -- and in the meanwhile reinforces tried and true women-hating caricatures.
Even though the words come from the mouths of villains, the movie validates the notion that "women are trying to be men" ("while you were trying to be men, we were becoming gods"), career-minded women are frigid ("we haven't made love in over a year") and "castrating bitches", who (in a bold new move) are threatening to take over the world. I'll say it again: NOT funny.
* * * * *
The Stepford Wives remake tries to update itself to present day by throwing in topical political commentary. But it's the kind of humor that you would receive in an email from your inappropriate uncle, who inundates every member in the family tree with "I thought this was funny" spam.
Easy targets: AOL, Microsoft, SUVs. It has the painful everyone-agrees-with-this-opinion sensibility that made Addams Family 2 such an appalling follow up to it's predecessor. ...It's the notion that people will connect with your movie if you throw in brand names in the dialogue, ones that the audience members are likely to use.
Oh, and thanks for the favor -- but no thanks -- for trying to update the Stepford Wives by including a gay couple! I will give the producers this much credit: the gay man who was slated for murder was "effeminate" and woman-like. This could be commentary on the way in which the gay community has come to hate femininity within itself, as part of its damnable deal with straight men to understand sexual orientation as a biological light switch, having nothing to do with gender expression whatsoever. But given the rest of the movie, I find it hard to believe that the producers were really so astute.
...Because the gay men in Stepford Wives have stepped right out of The Birdcage. They are gross old stereotypes, that Hollywood is still congratulating itself for propagating, thinking itself so liberal. Let's all laugh at the fag.
The only political jabs that I actually smirked at came from Bette Midler. The Stepford Wives are sitting together mid-summer talking about a book on Christmas decorations. Oh, but we're open-minded they say -- there's a section on using pine cones to make menorrahs, etc. "I think I'll use pine cones to spell out 'BIG JEW' on my front lawn," Midler quips. Tickles my irritation with how Hannukah has been misinterpretted as the Jewish equivalent of Christmas. Might not tickle everyone, of course.
* * * * *
OK, a few comments on the formal aspects of the film...
I don't know when I've heard such a badly done score. The music, trying to sound like Danny Elfman, completely overwhelmed the scenes it accompanied.
Worst use of CG I've seen in a long time. There was a CG robo-puppy thrown in. Just awful.
Everything had to be s-p-e-l-l-e-d out for the audience. The scene where the Men's Association introduces Broderick to their work: all there on screen. The robots are shown for what they are almost immediately, with sparks shooting from the ears, with speech warbles, and -- yes -- remote controls. Appropo of nothing, simply so we'll "get it", Kidman finds the remote control for her own robot. Christopher Walken explains with a peppy video segment exactly how the robots are made -- and we get to go into the processing room. No mystery there.
Perhaps most damning of all, in terms of formal aspects: the story itself is inconsistent. Are the Stepford Wives robots? Or are they flesh-and-blood with control-chips in their brains? Well, in one horrifying moment we see a husband use his wife as an ATM machine, and money spits out of her mouth. [I think everyone was waiting, hoping that for-the-love-of-god the money wouldn't spit out from some other orifice...] That indicates robot -- but later we get to see x-rays of the chips in the women's brains.
And of course, everything ends happily!!!!! The chips are disabled by lovable Mathew Broderick, and everyone is restored to normal. The men in the Men's Association? Their punishment is to have to go shopping at the grocery store indefinately! HA HA HA!
Grrrrrrrr... Let us recall that Broderick, only a few minutes before was seriously contemplating murdering his wife. I'm in no mood to treat him as a sympathetic character, no matter which side of the fence he came down on.
Oh, and what made him change his mind? A tear and a kiss from Kidman. That's what will save humanity: true love. That's what justifies women not being MURDERED: putting out.
Unforgivable.
* * * * *
Frank Oz directed this monstrosity. I hear that a few weeks before the movie's release, they reshot the end. Interesting. The same thing happened when he made "Little Shop of Horrors". [In the original ending, the plant isn't defeated -- it takes over the world.] ...Is this Oz's second attempt to produce an "ends-badly, but funny most of the time" comedy-horror film?
You have to wonder: where was the film meant to end? With the tableau of Glen Close clutching the robotic head of her "Stepford Husband" Christopher Walken? It's a strange shot that almost works as horrible-humorous -- but doesn't quite.
Regardless of where the film was meant to end, or what other changes were made to it, Stepford Wives is so consistently bad that there's little hope that it's really the fault of Hollywood executives and focus groups. Frank Oz has produced a truly bad, even offensive film.
Unforgivable. Damnably unforgivable.
Spoilers? How could I possibly spoil a film that so expertly spoiled itself?
How can you say that this movie was based upon Ira Levin's book? More like "sewn together from the mutilated body parts of its corpse."
Fifteen minutes into the film, I was already mentally writing my review:
E.
vis.
cer.
ated.
...This movie eviscerated the excellent book that it was based upon, as well as the competent adaptation from 1975 (which seems even more competent in comparison).
I wondered beforehand how an updated remake would be handled. The original book and movie are quite dated. They're set at the moment in history where the American Women's Liberation movement is hitting its peak. A pivotal moment in the book has to do with realizing that there was a strong chapter of NOW in Stepford that has entirely disappeared. How would the new movie choose to portray feminism in the first decade of the 2000's?
Well, in the new version, the evil mastermind behind it all turns out to be... Martha Stewart. Yes, that's right. The male mastermind behind the Men's Association turns out to be a robot himself, created by his wife. She's a brilliant neurosurgeon, who longs for the "perfection" of the 1950's. So, in essence, if we are to take this social satire at all seriously, the Barbie-fication of women in contemporary society is to be blamed upon their foremothers from the 50's. That's quite a revision from the original!
There has always been some argument about whether the original Stepford Wives was itself misogynist, or instead an anti-sexist allegory about the-evil-that-men-do. Personally, I think it's pretty clear that Ira Levin's sensibilities where feminist in nature, and the misogyny in the story is meant to be read as a horrible thing...
In my opinion, the new film thinks that it is being anti-sexist, but fails. The new film IS misogynist in many respects. My inner warning alarms started going off in the very first scene of the movie. Joanne (Nicole Kidman), who runs a TV network, is delivering a speech to an auditorium when a disgruntled male contestant from one of her shows interupts. After some back and forth, he shouts "I have an idea: kill all women!"
If this were a dark prelude to the the murderous intentions of the Men's Association, the producers of Stepford Wives might have been able to justify this scene. But instead, it seems to be meant to be humorous. NOT funny. Does anyone else remember the Montreal Massacre? Where a male college student who was angry at his former partner decided to go on a shooting spree, targeting specifically women at his school? What I know of Canadian culture and how it responded to that event leads me to think that this scene won't be being laughed at north of the border.
Soon after, Mathew Broderick (Joanne's husband) more or less tells Kidman that the attack was justified. He spouts off lines about how all women who wear black are "castrating bitches". He tells Kidman that she's become the sort of woman who inspires people to kill her. ...Are these comments meant to show the seed of evil in Broderick that will later lead to him killing his wife? No! Broderick is the good and honest husband, a sympathetic character in this movie, and what we've seen of Kidman previously leads the viewer to think that these statements are supposed to be true ones, serious commentary on what career-minded women have become in modern society.
The underlying message of the new Stepford Wives, gender-wise, is that "Both men and women can be horrible people. The solution is somewhere in the middle." But oddly enough, the movie's main message may not even be about gender. Why do men and women become horrible people? Because they long for impossible perfection, apparently -- either from their partners, or from themselves (if they're women).
So, condensing those messages once again, what we're being told is that (A) both men and women can be sexist, and (B) the root of sexism is wishing for an impossible perfection.
I gotta address this "both men and women can be sexist" notion. First off, I validate the notion that women can be bigotted toward men. It is a wrong that is worth talking about. However, I have NEVER heard someone talk about women's prejudice against men in a way that satisfies me. Women's prejudice toward men, and men's prejudice toward women, are not mirror images of each other. There's a dialectic: statements such as "men are pigs" have evolved over decades in response to a history of women being treated as men's property that lasted for at least hundreds of years...
That doesn't mean that men's prejudice is "worse", and that women's should just be ignored. There's a danger in referencing history, that it will be used to perpetually excuse the bad behavior of women in the present. To some extent, actions do have to have to be judged on their own merit, in the present. ...But what I hear underlying most criticisms of women's prejudice is "See? Women can be just as bad as men!" It sounds to me like men making excuses: if you're just as dirty as we are, then we're off the hook.
What I want to hear is complicated. What men has done is wrong, and men need to take responsibility for being different. The historical reasons why women's bigotry has evolved as it has need to be acknowledged. And women should strive for a higher standard. There's room for some grousing; but any emerging culture of slander-as-empowerment should be cut off at the root. Preferably by women themselves. But if men are compelled to condemn bigotry on the part of women, then it should be grounded in a clear sense of what ideals men should also be striving for simultaneously.
See, part of what has ennobled feminist criticisms of men has been a basically humanist vision that we could ALL be better. Men feeling motivated to criticize women "because women started it" is unworthy.
So, back to the movie. How is it misogynist? It is misogynist because despite delusions of criticising men AND women's sexism even-handedly, it merely slanders both -- and in the meanwhile reinforces tried and true women-hating caricatures.
Even though the words come from the mouths of villains, the movie validates the notion that "women are trying to be men" ("while you were trying to be men, we were becoming gods"), career-minded women are frigid ("we haven't made love in over a year") and "castrating bitches", who (in a bold new move) are threatening to take over the world. I'll say it again: NOT funny.
The Stepford Wives remake tries to update itself to present day by throwing in topical political commentary. But it's the kind of humor that you would receive in an email from your inappropriate uncle, who inundates every member in the family tree with "I thought this was funny" spam.
Easy targets: AOL, Microsoft, SUVs. It has the painful everyone-agrees-with-this-opinion sensibility that made Addams Family 2 such an appalling follow up to it's predecessor. ...It's the notion that people will connect with your movie if you throw in brand names in the dialogue, ones that the audience members are likely to use.
Oh, and thanks for the favor -- but no thanks -- for trying to update the Stepford Wives by including a gay couple! I will give the producers this much credit: the gay man who was slated for murder was "effeminate" and woman-like. This could be commentary on the way in which the gay community has come to hate femininity within itself, as part of its damnable deal with straight men to understand sexual orientation as a biological light switch, having nothing to do with gender expression whatsoever. But given the rest of the movie, I find it hard to believe that the producers were really so astute.
...Because the gay men in Stepford Wives have stepped right out of The Birdcage. They are gross old stereotypes, that Hollywood is still congratulating itself for propagating, thinking itself so liberal. Let's all laugh at the fag.
The only political jabs that I actually smirked at came from Bette Midler. The Stepford Wives are sitting together mid-summer talking about a book on Christmas decorations. Oh, but we're open-minded they say -- there's a section on using pine cones to make menorrahs, etc. "I think I'll use pine cones to spell out 'BIG JEW' on my front lawn," Midler quips. Tickles my irritation with how Hannukah has been misinterpretted as the Jewish equivalent of Christmas. Might not tickle everyone, of course.
OK, a few comments on the formal aspects of the film...
I don't know when I've heard such a badly done score. The music, trying to sound like Danny Elfman, completely overwhelmed the scenes it accompanied.
Worst use of CG I've seen in a long time. There was a CG robo-puppy thrown in. Just awful.
Everything had to be s-p-e-l-l-e-d out for the audience. The scene where the Men's Association introduces Broderick to their work: all there on screen. The robots are shown for what they are almost immediately, with sparks shooting from the ears, with speech warbles, and -- yes -- remote controls. Appropo of nothing, simply so we'll "get it", Kidman finds the remote control for her own robot. Christopher Walken explains with a peppy video segment exactly how the robots are made -- and we get to go into the processing room. No mystery there.
Perhaps most damning of all, in terms of formal aspects: the story itself is inconsistent. Are the Stepford Wives robots? Or are they flesh-and-blood with control-chips in their brains? Well, in one horrifying moment we see a husband use his wife as an ATM machine, and money spits out of her mouth. [I think everyone was waiting, hoping that for-the-love-of-god the money wouldn't spit out from some other orifice...] That indicates robot -- but later we get to see x-rays of the chips in the women's brains.
And of course, everything ends happily!!!!! The chips are disabled by lovable Mathew Broderick, and everyone is restored to normal. The men in the Men's Association? Their punishment is to have to go shopping at the grocery store indefinately! HA HA HA!
Grrrrrrrr... Let us recall that Broderick, only a few minutes before was seriously contemplating murdering his wife. I'm in no mood to treat him as a sympathetic character, no matter which side of the fence he came down on.
Oh, and what made him change his mind? A tear and a kiss from Kidman. That's what will save humanity: true love. That's what justifies women not being MURDERED: putting out.
Unforgivable.
Frank Oz directed this monstrosity. I hear that a few weeks before the movie's release, they reshot the end. Interesting. The same thing happened when he made "Little Shop of Horrors". [In the original ending, the plant isn't defeated -- it takes over the world.] ...Is this Oz's second attempt to produce an "ends-badly, but funny most of the time" comedy-horror film?
You have to wonder: where was the film meant to end? With the tableau of Glen Close clutching the robotic head of her "Stepford Husband" Christopher Walken? It's a strange shot that almost works as horrible-humorous -- but doesn't quite.
Regardless of where the film was meant to end, or what other changes were made to it, Stepford Wives is so consistently bad that there's little hope that it's really the fault of Hollywood executives and focus groups. Frank Oz has produced a truly bad, even offensive film.
Unforgivable. Damnably unforgivable.
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