July 18, 2008, - 1:35 pm
“Mamma Mia!”? More like Homo Mia: Former James Bond Falls Far in Painful Movie Aimed at Gays, Women; Feminist Attack on Batman
By Debbie Schlussel
Did you know that feminists are trying to turn this weekend’s box office take into a battle of the sexes? They are, and in this “Mamma Mia!” versus “The Dark Knight” contest, it’s really no contest. They’re gonna lose.
When the “Sex and the City” movie came out earlier this year, I wrote that it was a national IQ test for women. If you liked it, you failed. What I didn’t realize is that it was a two-part test.
The second part debuted at Midnight, last night. It’s “Mamma Mia!” More like Homo Mia! This dopey, annoying musical set to the songs of ’70s pop group, “ABBA,” is an ode to slutdom and what gay men want to project onto straight women and their relationships.
And it’s painful. The three middle-aged, haggish, oversexed women at the center of it all–Meryl Streep, Christine Baranski, and some chick with a butch haircut and an English accent, whose name I don’t care to know–are the “Sex and the City” women in ten years. Blechhhh! Who wants to see and hear three dirty old women simultaneously having hot flashes and yearning for orgasms, set to music now played only in gay dance clubs?
Middle-aged women and gay men. That’s who. Yesterday, I arrived late to the screening of the movie, and I went to a midnight showing to see the beginning that I missed. Amidst a cinema multiplex filled with males attending several sold-out showings of the excellent-but-violent Batman flick, “The Dark Knight,” the theater also had the midnight showing of “MM!” thinking that women would flock to see it, while their husbands and boyfriends saw Batman. No such “luck.” In the empty theater along with me were three middle-aged women and a gay guy. In his effeminate voice, he said to me, “I’m not a Batman guy, I’m a Mamma Mia guy.” No kidding. (Except maybe about the “guy” part.)
There’s some sort of weird feminist anti-Batman backlash hype the press is trying to generate against “The Dark Knight” and in favor of “MM!” USA Today did a whole piece on this movie as “The Dark Knight” for women and a sign of grrrrlpower at the movies. And this weekend, NOW–the National Organization for (Ugly) Women–is billing its three-day annual conference in Bethesda, Maryland, with this theme:
No Capes, No Masks, No Boundaries: Feminist Super-Women Unite!
Uh, no thanks. “Super-Women”? There’s a reason no-one uses “Wonder Woman” and “NOW” together in the same sentence.
Since it’s a musical, you have to wonder why they cast Pierce Brosnan as one of the male co-stars. Hearing him attempt to sing is like hearing the sound of animals being beheaded. Truly distressing and excruciatingly painful. I searched in vain for the industrial strength earplugs I keep in my purse.
It’s truly embarrassing and pathetic to see the fall of this formerly suave James Bond now forced into singing, karaoke-style, the playlist of an Elton John-George Michael soiree, while wearing–as he does at the movie’s conclusion–a fluorescent, tight jumpsuit and platform high-heeled boots. How do you say “007” in fruity-speak?
Then, there’s the plot of this thing: Meryl Streep plays a single mother hippie whose daughter is getting married. The daughter doesn’t know who her real dad is and surreptitiously read mom’s diary to find out. During the time she was conceived her mother slept with three different men, so she invites all of them to her wedding. The tripartite family values of being a slut, I guess.
In the meantime, Streep is trying to dissuade her daughter from getting married and push her toward pursuing her career instead, which (this isn’t a spoiler because you really don’t care anyway) is what she ultimately does. And all the while, Streep’s two slutty, middle-aged friends in heat are desperately hitting on anything in pants. Embarrassing and classless.
The message of the movie: marriage is bad, and ho-dom and sluttery ain’t no big thang. Everything all works out in happiness at the end of such a lifestyle. At least, on-screen.
Most of the movie is women crying, weeping, or shrieking hysterically. Who needs it? The “jokes” in this movie are so bad, it’s not funny. I didn’t laugh once. Listening to the throngs of mindless women who crowded the evening screening cackling loudly and non-stop at the most lame of lines and scenes drove me crazy. It was unbearable. As was their applause and standing ovation at the end for this unworthy, substandard, mindless waste. Oy vey.
If there’s one thing that’s good about this movie, it’s Meryl Streep’s surprisingly decent singing voice. But it’s not enough to justify wasting ten bucks and two hours.
It’s not that I don’t like musicals–one of my favorite movies is the classic, “Showboat.” And last year’s “Sweeney Todd” was cool. It’s that I don’t like dumb movies that waste two hours of my life I’ll never get back.
And I don’t dislike some of ABBA’s hits either. It’s just that in this movie, the ’70s called, and they want their songs back. The members of the now defunct ABBA are not complaining, of course, because this is a new and expanding revenue source for them. And I can’t blame them.
But if you’re a guy whose wife or girlfriend wants to drag you to see “Mamma Mia,” take it from me, kill yourself first. You’ll thank me from your man cave in Heaven.
Keep your manhood–and sanity–intact, and go see “The Dark Knight,” instead.
The only ABBA song that truly fits here is “S.O.S.” But this ship is beyond saving.
THREE MARXES
Are you sure you weren’t in a Hillary write-in campaign meeting?
CapitalistGig on July 18, 2008 at 2:27 pm