Ghostbusters vs masculinity's downranking campaign against "women's" movies and TV

boing
41

I absolutely hated this movie. It was a blatant lazy cash grab with no plot (just random things happening) and terrible, forced one-liners that uses feminism as a shield to prevent any negative criticism. The only character who actually did anything was the engineer, the rest were useless for no reason (which proves horrible writing to me). I think the only scenes that made me laugh involved Kevin (mostly the sandwich scene at the end), and the silence of the half-full theater agreed.
I didn’t like it in theaters, but I re-watched Ghostbusters I and II later that night and it just made me loathe the reboot.

Can I get a good sci-fi/fantasy movie with women protagonists that doesn’t use “we’re being progressive!” as a get-out-of-effort card? And can news media stop protecting these insults of media trying to pander to my gender?

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42

Stop? Who the hell started? None of you should listen to these things. Other than a VERY small number of critics who I respect, I rarely listen to anyone’s reviews. I might value some close friends opinions, but generally if I am interested, I will go see it. I don’t think I have never NOT seen something because someone told me it’s bad. I have SEEN something because someone told me it is good.

Ghostbusters will have detractors no matter what because it is a COMEDY movie. Comedy is EXTREMELY subjective. There are smart comedies, comedies full of toilet humor (which a friend told me the new Ghostbusters seems to have a lot of), dry wit, physical slapstick, gross out, sexual humor, campy, etc etc etc. The funniest movie I have ever seen was Southpark’s movie, though it isn’t exactly a shining example of high brow cinema. But as I pointed out before, the only reason the first film worked was both tight writing and the chemistry of the actors. The 2nd one didn’t work nearly as well. So I guess I will just have to wait and see when I get around to it if I like it or not. If I don’t it will be because of the story, humor (or lack there of) or possibly the cast not gelling, not just because they swapped the genders.

Who said she was the best driver? Maybe she stabbed the old driver in the throat and they were like, whelp, you’re the new driver. Then later she lost her arm and they managed to hook her up with a new one. Maybe she was related or involved with someone else in power, they died, and she took their place. I mean there are 101 ideas out there to explain why she was where she was. Christ, who cares? I don’t usually worry about justifying everyone’s back story before enjoying the story. Hell, how could and idiot like Ray Stanz be an expert on anything?

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43

The grain of truth in many of the negative reviews is that the movie isn’t perfect, and is pretty much gee-whiz herp-a-derp popcorn fuel. The original is better. But this is good and fun and worth your $15.

Also: you can fight the patriarchy in more ways than one, and supporting strong images of women in our media is one of the ways that you can fight the patriarchy (and enjoy a fun flick to boot). You don’t have to choose to do one or the other.

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44

The problem with “ratings” is that, at best, is soft data. It is similar to “consumer preference” studies, it is impossible to standardise these scores, they are by definition relative and we cannot extract a lot of conclusions from them

In the case of movies, a score in a scale 0-5 is just that, a score. Some people will give a score based on technical quality and other will give it a different score purely based on whether they like a particular actor or not.

So in this case, if we accept the premises of this demographic study, it seems clear that man (in general) hate the new ghostbusters movie, and the conclusion is that the majority of men (sorry, I mean manbabies) cannot tolerate the idea of strong women taking care of things (fear of emasculation and all)

Another interpretation could be that women score this particular movie much higher (female solidarity?) and they are willing to ignore the shortcomings

How do we know? we can’t, there is no standard to measure against and therefore, any interpretation of the data is flawed

But what I find interesting is that he ghostbusters reboot has been politically charged from day 1, it was quite a sight to watch all the youtubers starting their reviews with some sort of disclaimer, feeling forced to ensure their subscribers they had no problem with the all female cast. Frankly, I thought we where past that

And now that the film is out, I feel that many critics are giving it a free pass, scoring it higher that they normally would. They have seen the controversy created and they don’t want any problems.

So, to answer the question, some men hate the movie because the all female cast? yes

Do the majority of men hate the movie because of that? no, and if I go with my gut instinct, men that like this kind of fantasy-sci fi kind of flick are the least like to behave like this. Hey, the new start wars movie was a global success, it has a strong female character and only a few sour grapes complained about that

In the end, it is just a movie

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45

See, I don’t recall any of that. I almost was thinking that there was an inference that Abby (McCarthy) was gay for not having a physical interest in Kevin (Hemsworth).

I totally think China’s issue was with the undead look of some ghosts. They have a very strict “no bones showing” policy. Blizzard has completely different skins for undead characters in World of Warcraft for the China realms as a result.

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46

manbabies

I use the term babymen. Manbabies suggests they grew up a bit.

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47

To be fair, while I thought there was a lot to enjoy, by no means do I think it was a perfect movie, and I had some definite criticisms of it:
[SPOILERS, for those who haven’t seen it]

  • The humor is often a lot more broad and SNL-ish than the Bill Murray laid back cynical vibe of the original. The supporting cast plays things almost cartoonishly over-the-top and there’s a lot of moments that had me wondering what Paul Feig was thinking (like the dean going into his flicking-you-off routine, or the weirdly terrible rock concert scene that felt left over from Wayne’s World)
  • Kristin Wiig and Melissa McCarthy are both very funny ladies, but they’re both more or less ‘straight men’ here, the serious scientists. A lot of their humor comes from their moments of banter and bickering (“You go first? Oh, I’ll go first. Did you… oh, right. Next time, got it.”) Those frequent moments had a lot of the audience I saw it in howling with laughter, but they were just kind of annoying to me. YMMV most definitely.
  • The movie felt choppily edited, like there were chunks cut out that felt missing at times. Kevin makes the police force and citizens do a disco pose, and we’re all waiting to see why, with no payoff until we see the dance scene in the end credits; it felt like they filmed a whole disco scene, then decided it bogged the third act down and just cut it out, but left in the parts around it.
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48

the trailers don’t do the characters justice. And they do not give much away story wise.

Again, its simply not a bad move; if there was never an original Ghostbusters it would be considered better. Trying to “remake” one of what most people consider the greatest movies of a generation and certainly a genre defining move (Comedy Horror started here); its a rough go.

I see this not as a remake. It’s Ghostbusters 3 (alternate timeline GB). Marvel and DC do this with their comic franchises. And if you view the film in this light…Ghostbusters: Earth 2. It sort of makes more sense.

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49

But that’s not a good analogy! Try again!

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50

Ben Stiller is 50.
Bill Murray was 34 when Ghostbusters came out.

:wink:

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51

True! But his was one of the names being oft-mentioned by Dan Ackroyd as one of the new ‘young’ Ghostbusters. I’m just picturing him as the cynical guy of the team :slight_smile:

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52

Haven’t seen it yet. Did enjoy this generally negative review from a bunch of dudes whose film reviews I find entertaining and informative even when I disagree.

Oh, and their ‘trailer review’ is dead on re: youtube bullshit.

It does appear it might be less enjoyable for some fans of the original not because of WOMEN OMG CHILDHOOD KILLED, but because the style of comedy seems to have switched completely from dry and sarcastic to a broader (Judd Apatow-y?) improv style. I like Melissa McCarthy but didn’t like Bridesmaids, if that means anything.

I think the idea of gender switching is one of the fresher and more welcome concepts in this context, but have to watch the thing to find out if I like the other changes. Not really feeling so far this movie deserves to be the bastion of feminism people seem to be treating it as, but who knows.

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53

I don’t know who started, but that’s the whole raison d’etre for Rotten Tomatoes and I am told it is very popular.

That’s what I said! :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

What ever gave you that idea? Really, I want to know.

Yes.
What is your opinion of the movie? We can tell if you’re lying. :wink:

silly.jpg540×540 54.1 KB

So you’re saying the movie is good as in so far it achieved what the people involved making it were trying to achieve?
It would follow that any objections you would have stem from your own bias instead of objective truths about the world. (If you think about it, its a very kind way of saying we should agree to disagree)

Oh wait! that was a homophobic dig wasn’t it? Throwing shade is what they call it?

Love.

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54

Now, nobody likes a good laugh more than I do, except perhaps my wife and some of her friends. Oh yes, and Captain Johnson. Come to think of it, most people like a good laugh more than I do, but that’s beside the point. Now, let’s have a good, clean, healthy outdoor post-reply. Get some air into your lungs. Ten, nine, eight and all that…

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55

Totally. Humor is super subjective. If that sort of wackier comic style isn’t your thing, then you probably won’t get as much out of this movie. I saw with with a few people and some absolutely loved it, some were so-so on it, and one hated it so much he was angered. But everyone agreed that Holzmann is awesome.

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56

I find this is true of ALL online rating systems that don’t have common-sense rules for moderation. Just look at all the fanboys that up-vote releases by their favorite author (or actor, or band, etc.) within moments of being announced, no matter how many days, months, or even years before they’re available.

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57

Actually, I will agree. The style of comedy in this is entirely different. It is much more in the Judd Apatow vein. Given that it is Wiig and McCarthy headlining and two other mainstays from the current SNL it makes sense.

The old crew where a different SNL generation and came followed the Reitman style of comedy which is very different from Apatow.

I still feel the only thing GB 2016 was missing is simply a Peter Venkman-esque character. Wiig’s Emily just was not even close to it. I am, also semi surprised that comparison’s haven’t come out that Venkman was the brash and suave male who tried to seduce his love interest Dana with his wit and style. Where as Wiig’s Emily was fall-over weak-kneed in her interest’s presence Hemsworth’s dolt-but-hunky Kevin. Why did her character who was clearly educated and intelligent have to become such a one note “oh kevin” type?

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58

This is a good example of why you should look at how something does when you ignore the 10/10 and 1/10 ratings.

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59

Sounds like an intentional reversal? Like Janine went from takes-no-shit New Yorker to kind of a dumb puppy of a cute guy (based on the bits of pieces I’ve seen)?

As the fellows in the review I linked to mentioned, they seemed to enjoy reversing some other expectations apart from the more obvious one.

Not one white women and three black ones, sadly. Too far, I guess? Ok, I stole that from the review as well. I like these reviews, sue me.

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60

The whole thing from a marking standpoint has been a real fail from Sony. While I almost want to believe they were stoking those manbabies it to get attention but I would just vote for incompetence.

The cast was great but I do feel the editing and direction was really weak and leaned on ad libbing way too much over better defining both Wiig and McCarthy’s characters. There were too many things going on that wasn’t explained at all like why Kevin was suddenly defiantly wanting to be a ghostbuster.

This film and the Cast really don’t deserve all the hate they are getting but the film is really silly and harmless and hopefully will get a lot of young girls excited about geeky things.

I just wish the property was in the hands of a competent studio for the the rest of the films they wanted to do.

Can please we get Disney to take this franchise over?

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