Talk about offensive ad campaigns

[Guest Bitchboy]

First, I must say I'm in awe of people who only have to plunk down $5-$7 for a movie. Don't tell me you can get popcorn for under $5 as well!

 

Secondly, I ask if I'm the only one who has no desire whatsoever in seeing a face pick of that FFF guy? I've already seen far too many raving war lunatics and Republicans on CNN.

[Guest Dan]

>>To be fair, the only

>>gay characters shown in the trailer are some buff guys

>sitting

>>in chairs... I would say

>>that's pretty much on target.

>

>That stereotype is pretty much on target? You've either been

>watching way too much porn or looking at way too many escort

>pics or spending too much time at the Roxy. According to the

>CDC, 21% of American males were classified as obese in 2001,

>and trends show that it's increasing every year. Guess

>what...gay men are men, last time I checked. When we

>perpetuate the notion that all gay men are muscular and

>gorgeous, we negate the existence of gay men who don't fit

>that stereotype. No wonder so many gay men feel invisible.

>

>>As for him saying: "How can you

>>think I'm gaaaaaaay", he's standing there in a SHOWGIRL

>DRESS.

>

>Ummm...yeah, that's the point. Drag queens in a parade has

>nothing to do with the fact that the majority of crossdressers

>are heterosexual. Although Gender Identity Disorder (when

>someone exhibits behaviors or self-identification that is

>inconsistent with their apparent physical sex) is not

>considered a mental illness by the medical community, it

>is classified in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual

>of Mental Illness (DSM-IV) as Dual-Role Transvesticism, which

>states: "There is no sexual motivation for the

>cross-dressing." It is also defined in its counterpart,

>the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) as

>Transvestic Fetishism, which places greater emphasis on sexual

>arousal as a motivation: "Over a period of at least 6

>months, in a heterosexual male, recurrent, intense

>sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors

>involving cross-dressing." So, when Hollywood employs the

>age-old stereotype that gay men really want to be women, it's

>wrong and unfair. As Archie Bunker would say, "Case closed."

>

>P.S. Thanks for including the trailer. I hadn't noticed that

>last line: "This whole place is light on its feet!" (No

>comment necessary.)

>

Personaly, I don't mind if I'm thought of as "muscled and gorgeous!" Sorry Rick, but a protest of sterotypes if pretty funny coming from someone who is obsessed Diana Ross!

 

Dan Dare

http://meetlocalmen.com/mlm/dandarela.html

[Rick Munroe]

>Sorry Rick, but a protest of sterotypes if pretty

>funny coming from someone who is obsessed (with) Diana Ross!

 

And funny, Dan, that my "obsession" was inherited from my straight parents, straight cousin & her husband, and straight brother, all of whom were/are huge Ross/Supremes fans and all of whom, at one time or another, took me, as a boy, to Diana Ross/Supremes/Mary Wilson concerts (my parents even stood in the rain at Miss Ross's Central Park disaster). One reason I was so anti-drug my whole life was the trauma :+ of being made to watch Lady Sings the Blues so much as a kid. And my straight brother owned a Diana Ross doll long before I got one. Oh well, Dan, there goes that stereotype shot to hell.

[DaninWA]

RE: Talk about offensive

 

I saw "Boat Trip" yesterday and thought it was very funny. Of course, I go to movies in order to turn my brain off and enjoy some mindless fun, not for intellectual stimulation.

 

If this is all you want out of the experience, then "Boat Trip" is perfect.

 

Dan

[Flower]

[font color ="blue"

] >First, I must say I'm in awe of people who only have to plunk

>down $5-$7 for a movie. Don't tell me you can get popcorn for

>under $5 as well!

 

[font color ="green"

] Well you'd really be in AWE of Flower ;-) who pays only $4.50 for a matinee at the best movie theater in town; $7.50 after 5 PM LOL :+ BUT also miss a lot of the good movies since Cinemart here neither thinks we need art films, foreign films, NOR gay films

 

 

[font color ="blue"

] >Secondly, I ask if I'm the only one who has no desire>whatsoever in seeing >a face pick of that FFF guy? I've already seen far too many raving war lunatics >and Republicans

>on CNN. ;-)

 

[font color ="green"

] Nope--don't feel like the lone ranger--I couldn't care less what he looks like--only assholes I care to see are on cute and sexi bois :+

[Guest tcd31]

RE: Talk about offensive

 

>Sean Connery can mount my ass any day. }(

 

 

He sure looked fantastic on the Oscars last night (regardless of Steve Martin's crack about his outfit). And that deep voice with the Scots accent!

Of course, he's always been able to do it for me: when I was 12, seeing Thunderball and getting turned on by Sean was one of the first things that made me realize I was gay.

[Guest feisty1]

>This is an interesting point. He's a short, buffed man with a

>lot of neurotic gestures and a high voice. As such, his

>screen persona is vulnerable to being 'homosexualized' in the

>popular imagination.

 

Well, I don't know about the popular imagination, but during 'Jerry McGuire' I was trying to homosexualize him in my imagination.

 

>I think he sometimes tries to compensate

>for this. In the moronic ensemble comedy 'Rat Race' he

>impersonates a bus driver because he needs a vehicle, but ends

>up driving a busload of Lucy Ricardo wannabes who are on their

>way to an 'I Love Lucy' convention. When one of the Lucies

>turns out to be a drag queen, Cuba screams in panic, then

>immediately starts to demand that she stand behind the yellow

>safety line. The message is clear: he's a 'real man' who's

>horrified by contact with this 'freak' and his first gesture

>is to separate themselves with a proverbial line in the sand.

 

I doubt I wouldv'e noticed the 'Boat Trip' trailer at all, had I not been struck by the similarity between Gooding's over-the-top reactions in it and in the 'Rat Race' scene you mention. At the time I saw 'RR' I thought it was just a badly handled scene, whether by Gooding or the director or both, but now I wonder if Gooding isn't making a career out of toying with his predisposition to being, if not effeminate, then not quite masculine. IMO, you've misinterpreted the message.

 

Gooding's in an odd position - an almost-leading-man, a black actor who specializes in comedies but avoids comedies aimed at blacks. He's no Denzel Washington, and he's also no Jamie Foxx. Foxx, in the films of his I've seen ('Booty Call' most recently - very funny), often displays the kind-of hyper-masculine attitude and bearing that Gooding is incapable of, yet Foxx seems so secure in his sexuality that homosexuality, when the spectre is raised, isn't a threat to the characters he plays. I think the implications are that the Foxx-type guy is masculine enough not to be threatened, while the Gooding-type guy isn't. It's not that Gooding is a 'real man' who's horrified by contact with homosexuality, it's that he's not man enough to brush it aside or take it in stride the way a 'real' (straight) man would.

 

By now audiences are conditioned not to expect the type of broad, farcical reactions that Gooding delivers to something so benign as a drag queen (especially on a bus full of Lucy impersonators, not that I've ever been on one) . It's not a concept that's going to shock the audience, so Gooding's reaction seems bizarre unless you take it in the context of teen and adult sex comedies of the past several years. In the 'American Pie' films, it's Stiffler-the-moron (played by my wished-for heartthrob Seann William Scott -- WOOF WOOF) who's obsessed with homosexuality -- all the more mature guys don't give it much thought. And in 'Road Trip,' Scott again, playing a similar character, ends up having a life-changing experience when he gets a prostrate massage. It seems to me the implication in most of these types of films -- 'Rat Race' included -- is that the guys who can't handle the idea of homosexuality are the closet cases. 'Boat Trip' may be an exception, of course -- I'm not planning on seeing it (and I have a soft spot for moronic comedies, obviously!).

 

BTW, I quite enjoyed 'Rat Race' -- there hasn't been a movie quite like it since 'It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World.' It lacked Ethel Merman, but it had Whoopi Goldberg and Kathy Najimy and Seth Green and John Cleese and Rowan 'Black Adder-Mr. Bean' Atkinson amongst others -- an awful lot of comedic talent. It was great late-night cable viewing, anyway.

 

--Michael

N.P. - "A Shark in Jet's Clothing" - Blondie